Icelandic Sheepdog of Canada

Icelandic Sheepdog Show/Working Yahoo Group

2009-10-26T18:49:00.002-05:00

This Group is intended for folks that own Icelandic Sheepdogs also known as Iceland Sheepdog or the ISD Are you interested in owning an Icelandic Sheepdog?

Consider joinging an being part of the active and growing community across North America. We welcome Iceland Sheepdog owners from Canada, the United States and Europe. We welcome everyone interested in the Icelandic Sheepdog,

We have long term Worldwide an N.A. Breeders on the list to answer your questions.You do not need to be belong to any club nor pay a fee in order to be a member of our group, just a interest for the breed is all that is required.

We welcome Showing Owners an Breeders, who might want to talk about Planned Breedings, Look for Studs, want help in evaulating litters. We welcome folks wanting to learn about the breed, and or breeding the Icelandic Sheepdog.Anything to do with planning, breeding, whelping, raising or training your Icelandic Sheepdog Dog is welcome on the list.

Breeders are encourged to list Available Studs, Planned Litters, and Available Possable Show/Breeding or possable Working Puppies.

Are you are looking for an Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy? This will be good group to consider joining to learn about the breed, member breeders are allowed to post planned, coming and available Icelandic Sheepdogs puppies on the list, we encourge photos!

Are you training in Rally, Obedance, Agility or Herding or any other dog sport! You do not need to be working at competitive level in order to enjoy the list.Althought this is mainly a list for Showing an Working Dogs, all related Iceland Sheepdog Brags or Questions are welcome.

Don't see your fellow Icelandic Sheepdog Friends on the list? Please let them know about this group, as we are looking forward to the continued growth of this wonderful active working breed of dog in the coming future

http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/ISDShowDogs/

New Website Address

2009-07-31T10:36:00.002-05:00

Hi Folks

Gotten to busy to update on the blog in the past while

Please check out our new website at

www.icelandicsheepdogs1.com

for the most recent updates on the dogs and current puppies for sale and planned litters.

Happy Halloween

2008-10-31T15:36:00.001-05:00

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies -The Whole Litter!

2008-02-20T11:25:00.002-05:00

Hello Folks, wow, almost a week old already, and Growing-Growing.. the puppies are doing wonderful.. what a colorful pretty litter, I just love these wonderful typical Icelandic Sheepdog white markings, as per the Breed Standard. These are going to be very flashy Adult Icelandics.

Have a great day from the waggy tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang.

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies for Sale - 3 Females and 1 Male Available.

New Barn Babies and updates on a this and that..plus Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies

2008-02-19T08:15:00.003-05:00

Hello Folks

Wow, were has the time gone, first between storms-Snow Storms-Wind Storms-Freezing Rain Storms- Power has been off at least once and the drifts are so bad this year..

We have new lambs and new kids in the barn, all are doing well but keeping me very busy, my bottle lambs and kid are just about getting big enough to be weaned, so within a short time hopefully that will be one less chore to be done a number of times per day.

The new litter of bunnies are doing well and growing well but also require regular checks at this point as one of them got out of the box and its just way to cold to have this happen so we raised the height of the ledge that keeps them in the inside box. Its working well so far.

The puppies are amazing and when I am not doing chores inside and outside on the farm, I seem to be spending a great deal of time by the whelping box, and have started the neonatal stress tests for the puppies and they are doing great. Everyone will have doubled their birthweights by total, almost there last night on the daily puppy weigh -in.

I had to laugh at Jason last night because we were snuggling puppies on the bed, one each and Jason said, o my god look at how light it is behind this puppies ears, normally its a deep dark red starting at this age behind the ears, but as these are Chincilla factor puppies, they are in fact going to lighten as they grow up, and become a wonderful rich cream color (think heavy really cow's cream) and as they are our first Chincilla puppies, this was the first time Jason had seen this and he found it quite amazing. Blackmore's Tan is already coming in, she is showing her tri markings under her tail, on her legs, and one her face already, she still appears to be a long hair.

What pretty puppies they are, so flashy and I must admit to being thrilled to see just how even this litter is in all ways, I have a feeling they are going to turn out to be a litter to watch.

So Greenstone Fire an Ice really needed to get out and get some show training so we slipped off the farm for the ottawa kennel club show on March 16th, and I put a photo of Duchess with her Handler Linda in the show ring, she is just six months and this was her first show.

Greenstone Fire an Ice took Best of Breed, Best Puppy in Breed and Group 2nd..

Well, I had better get back to work, I will be taking new photos of the puppies on Thursday, and will post them then.

Have a great day from the Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies for Sale - Three Females and One Male

For more information contact isdpuppies@hotmail.com

Icelandic Sheepdog Newborn Puppy Photos!

2008-02-14T12:14:00.002-05:00

Hello Folks,

Newborn photos of the babies on? What else, a sheepskin rug.. So cute.. Enjoy their photos.. so cute..

Have a good day from the Waggy Tail Icelandic Sheepdog Gang

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies for Sale- Please contact for more information.

isdpuppies@hotmail.com

Icelandic Sheepdog Valentine Litter is HERE!!!!

2008-02-14T09:48:00.002-05:00

Hello Folks,

What a long! night but we have new puppies..

We are pleased to annouce that we have been honored to have four new Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies join our home.

After making me wait all day, they were indeed determined to be born on Valentines Day..

First Born is Greenstone Blackmores Knight - A stunning Black Tri Female, she is very much her father's daughter with typical white markings, Blaze, collar, Chest, socks and white tail tip, she appears to be a long hair, and has Double Dewclaws on both back legs.

Second Born is Greenstone Rudolf Valentino - A HUGE lovely Chinchilla Male, this boy is a whooper! He just screams MALE, in his head and chest even as a newborn. Very striking markings, Blaze, Collar, Chests, Socks and a small white tail tip, Double Dewclaws on both rear legs. Appears at this time to be a Med Coat

Third Born is Greenstone Cinnamon Girl - A nice big female Chinchilla, she has the same markings as Grandma Ima, Ch Belglen Risna, and Greenstone Fire and Ice , right down to her swing of color on her collar. Appears at this time to be a Med coat. Nice double dewclaws on her rear legs.

Fourth Born is Greenstone Sugar an Spice - is a very pretty refined chincilla female, she has the very same white color pattern as her Uncle Ch Belglen Riddari, in terms of her wide collar and full white chest and front legs, she is a lovely Ying/Yang in face ,with a Tinni Spot on her head and two full colored ears, she has a white tail tip, and appears to be a med coat at this time. She has double Dewclaws on both rear legs.

All the puppies are doing wonderful, they were all born very close together in birth weights for the females and as expected the big male is heavier. All are nursing and content, now if only I could get some sleep..

Happy Valentines Day Everyone, Photos are coming later today..

Have a great day from the waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang..

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies for sale- please inquire if you are interested in learning more.

isdpuppies@hotmail.com

I want my Whelping Box!! LOL Icelandic Sheepdog Momma Dogs can be SO demanding LOL

2008-02-13T10:23:00.002-05:00

Hi Folks

I love momma dogs, why is it that if they have their heads in a nice dark spot that they think I can't see their butts and big old belly out the rear end..

Well, I think that Vaskur really knew what he was doing and that Runa was ready on their first breeding, and that we will have puppies a bit early..

I was a bit surprised this morning, when a certain (always Staving MOM!) momma dog to be didn't want her breakfast.. hmmmm tip off number one..

Then came the walk up and give you the "STARE"- I want something from you.. hmmmm Tip number 2 that something is up...

Then comes the I will check out every corner and dark spot on the main floor, even though I have already checked them before and declared them not good enough for MY pups.. but still tip off number 3.. digging on the bare floor with a look at me.. like.. hello where is my Blankets!!!

Finally as if I needed it, I was already setting up the day bed, and was in and out of the laundry room and who comes out with a big towel between her teeth that was stole from the clean laundry basket on the floor- Tip Four.. If you don't give me bedding I will just take it!

LOL... So now she has her very own den in the living room, complete with cover, tons of dog blankets to dig and move around to her hearts content, and when it was all put together, she walked in.. and settled down.. and nothing now.... so now we wait!

Needless to say, I am going to guess that we will have puppies today or tomorrow, will keep you posted..

Once she is alot closer, we will move downstairs to the real birthing box in our Master Bedroom, but I don't want to be tied to the bedroom all day and I do want to be able to keep a very close eye on her, so this is the middle ground, she is happy and I can still do my chores and housework, while listening for the sounds of digging etc.

I really hope she waits for Valentine day!!! How cool would that be...

Count down for puppies--- SOON-VERY SOON!

Have a great day from the Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang.

LOL Icelandic Sheepdogs at Play- My Stick, My Stick...

2008-02-12T09:08:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

BRRRRRR its cold today.. my goodness what a bright sunny but COLD morning has arrived on the farm..

Well we had to bundle up to watch the space station cross the sky last night.. very cool indeed.

So I had to share this photo.. here is Freyja who has managed to steal the stick, and Freyja and Olof in the dance.. I am sure you can tell they are playing, and having a ball at it.. man, the wind at that time.. it was coming in at about 45 kms an hour with gusts of up to 80 km.. and despite the cold and the wind, they still are out playing.. got to love those wonderful double coats.. Got to love Canada and its amazing winter weather.

A new Icelandic Valentine name came in last night..

21) Rudolph Valentino

Only five more days till the birth of our newest litter of Icelandic Sheepdogs puppies.-I have to put a side note.. I was counting movement yesterday and I as always am amazed when the puppies push back.. I swear one of them.. put all its feet out and said Hello.. I can't wait to meet them in person.. soon.. soon... soooooon.

Have a great day from the Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang.

Greenstone Cool Hand Luke Photo Update- New Names Idea's Added for our Icelandic Sheepdog Valentine Litter

2008-02-11T09:04:00.003-05:00

Hello Folks

It was a nice weekend despite the cold/snow/winds, these things never bother our lovely eqaully weather proof double coated med or long haired Icelandic Sheepdogs, they think playing out in a snow storm is a treat indeed.

Now got this lovely photo of Olof, but directly behind him was another dog sniffing the butt of a different dog, so if you think that the top looks wiggled with, thats because it is.. I refused to put the photo with the sniff going out, so I deleted it so I could put up the rest of the photo.. LOL

Names for the coming Litter -Thanks for the folks that wrote in the new name ideas, I have now updated the list.. keep them coming and I will keep adding them..

1) Be mine Valentine

2) Cupid's Arrow

3) Lady in Red

4) Sharp Dressed Man * This is a great name but was used for our kennel already.

5) Romancing the Stone

6) Saint Valentine

7) Ima Sassy Vixen

8)Sugar N Spice

9)Venus Icelandix

10)Moondance

11)Moon Shadow

12)Brown Eyed Girl

13)Heart of Gold

14)Royal Velvet

15)Vitta Red

16)Valentina Loverly

17) Love Me Tender

18)Bella Donna

19)Puppy Tail Kisses

20)Roses are Red

Only seven more days till the cutest litter of Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies are due!

Have a great Day from the Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang.

Getting Ready to go to the Shows- Icelandic Sheepdogs have 4 Shows to go to in Feb.

2008-02-10T09:04:00.001-05:00

Hello Folks
Well, its that kind of soft snow, kind of overcast but sort of warmish weather and the dogs are loving it!! My goodness, I wish that it would stop snowing just a bit more, as I don't want the Camera out in snow,

Well, we got our Ring times for the coming shows, all early morning times, looks like four days of getting up early, not a single day of sleeping in, but It would appear that I get out early enough on the last day, that I can drive home the same day, Group is starting at 1pm, so depending on weather and road conditions, I hope to head home right after.

I was watching the kids play yesterday and my goodness, does Duke remind me of AJay in movement, and overall outline, I can't wait to get him out into the show rings.

Check out Father to be of the litter showing off his wonderful coat/outline/type on the snow bank with Starpine Lily of the Tundra, this is one of my favorite photos from Iqaluit, Nunavut. Vaskur is so young here.. but so handsome

Countdown to our newest litter of Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies only eight more days till due date!

Have a great day from the waggy tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang..

show terminology.... humor involved..

2008-02-09T10:50:00.000-05:00

For those new to showing and breeding some essential terminology you shouldknow!!!

Dog Show Terms Explained!

Angulation-Degree to which dog handlers will bend over backwards to impressjudges.

Balance-

(a) How to arrange the checkbook so your husband won't know how muchmoney you spent on dog shows last month. Usually done in the bathroomwith the door locked;(

b) Ability to hold coffee, danish, leash, treats and entry form allat once.

Bitch-(a) Proper name for a female dog;

(b) Name often heard at dog shows, not always to describe a femaledog.

Blind Retrieve-When you can't see the toy under the furniture.

CGC-Canine Gastrointestinal Catastrophe {aka GAS}

Coat-The hairy covering of a dog that usually falls out about one weekbefore the Specialty show.

Crabbing-What you do when the judge doesn't like your dog.

Dam-

(a) A female dog with puppies;

(b) Expression frequently overheard at dog shows as losers leave thering.

Distemper-Shown by those competitors who just lost to someone they can't stand.

Dog-To chase a judge from show to show in an effort to attain more breedwins.

Double Bind-Finding two toys under the furniture.

Elbow-Method of getting to ringside quickly when late.

Expression-"Sweet" look adopted by hungry dogs while staring ravenously at chunksof liver.

Fancier-Degree to which some gentlemen handlers dress more than others.

Feathering-What winners are accused of doing to judges' nests.

Force Fetch-Dog drops the toy under furniture, scratches at the carpet until you'reforced to "fetch" it.

Front-Part of the dog often facing the outside of the ring.

Guard Hair-An activity in which one watches intently as the dog's hair falls out, inclumps, just after entries are mailed.

Heel-(a) What you feel like when your dog beats the one you had just sold to aneager novice;
(b) Expression often screamed to attract the attention of deaf dogs.

Hock-A way of financing your dog shows by the use of jewelry such as weddingrings.

Kennel-Where you go when the kids fight and your husband is in one of his moods.

Litter-Trash left all over the building and parking lot after a dog show.

Mask-What to wear when you have to show your gorgeous pick of the litter thatfell apart a week before the show.

Muzzle-What to put on your kids at a dog show to prevent them from calling yourcompetition what they overheard you call him last night.

Noseprints-Cute marks left all over your French doors.

Outcrossing-What your husband tells the minister you are doing out in the kennel withthe dog and the bitch.

Overshot-Running so fast as to pass the 1st place ring marker and plow into the judgeand the stewards.

Pedigree-Dog food with lots of coupons.

Points-Minute, invisible awards for winning which you cannot convince your spouseare more important than cash prizes.

Puppies-Small, dog like food-processing machines with the ability to stink up anentire house and collectively deafen a band of magpies. (These creatureshave not yet been perfected, as they come with leaky systems, and can alsobe dangerous to weak hearts and bank accounts.)

Qualifying Score-Justifying the 170.5 you got in obedience today.

Ribbons-What competitive exhibitors with distemper (see above) will cut you intowhen your dog places over theirs.

Specialty-Whatever your dog is good at, like bringing home branches or chewing on walls.

Type-What your dog has... if you turn down the lights and squint a little.

Utility-The kind of vehicle you need to haul around your dogs.

Posted by Jackie Linke

Spoiled Icelandic Sheepdog Mama to be

2008-02-09T08:12:00.000-05:00

Good Morning Folks

Well if you are like me, then you are always on the look out for new things for the dogs, new toys, new chew toys, new recipes for treats or meals, new leash/collar ideas, new dog beds, basicly anything and everything that can make my dogs life more interesting/comfortable I will try it at least once.

Well, I saw this ad in the farm store, for this heated bed, now it was not cheap and I drooled a bit over the idea of it, but the cost was high..and as my first thought was that would be great for in the whelping box for puppies to sleep on, my second thought was.. hmmm can it get wet without having issues.. Well a little research later and it turns out that while it can't get dunked, it is designed for outdoor living and getting a bit damp it is to be fine..

So this week a new flyer came out and it was on sale! Well that was what I was waiting for, and off to the store we went, I got the biggest one they had, and its still only the right size for a ISD.

Well I had to plug it in and set it up and see if any of the dogs liked it.. so Bella loves it, loves it enough that i might have to go back and get her one of her own in the future.. I am sure that the gentle warmth helps her sore older hips etc.

But the main dog that has "claimed it" is Runa, she first sat on it, then layed down and then leaned over and closed her eyes with a Ahh does that feel good, now it seems everytime I turn around she is laying down on it.. so I just had to get a photo of how cute she looks on her heated bed..Do you think she will share with the puppies?

Puppy countdown only nine more days till we have new Icelandic Sheepdog puppies Due

Have a good day from the Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang..

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies More Valentine Names

2008-02-08T08:27:00.000-05:00

Names idea so far, please send me your name ideas for the coming litter-Countdown is now on the way.. only ten more days till the litters due date.

1) Be mine Valentine
2) Cupid's Arrow
3) Lady in Red
4) Sharp Dressed Man * This is a great name but was used for our kennel already.
5) Romancing the Stone
6) Saint Valentine
7) Ima Sassy Vixen
8)Sugar N Spice
9)Venus Icelandix
10)Moondance
11)Moon Shadow
12)Brown Eyed Girl
13)Heart of Gold
14)Royal Velvet
15)Vitta Red
16)Valentina Loverly

Hello Folks, well another wonderful letter came in with name idea's and I wanted to say thank you so much for folks that are taking the time to come up with names, and to send them to me. Keep the names coming and I will keep posting them to inspire folks..

Have a great day from our wonderful Brown eyed, Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang.

Just a few Icelandics Sheepdog Hanging out!

2008-02-08T08:19:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

It was a just around 0 kind of day yesterday with big fat christmas snow, and as you can guess, the dogs wanted to spend most of their time outside playing in the fresh snow or in watching the world go by..

I had a blast watching them playing and finally thought, I should try and take a few photos of them.. anyway, these two are my favorite, mainly because they don't involve a great deal of colorful blurrs in a big mass running across the photos :)

Can you tell who is who??

Have a great day from the Waggy tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang..

Icelandic Sheepdog Valentine Names Update

2008-02-07T08:11:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Got my first letter with name idea's and thank you so much for them ;) so I thought, I would list the names and keep adding new names as they come in..

How neat having a Valentine litter....here are a few names that I thought of.....
1) Be mine Valentine
2) Cupid's Arrow
3) Lady in Red
4) Sharp Dressed Man * This is a great name but was used for our kennel already.
5) Romancing the Stone
6) Saint Valentine
7) Ima Sassy Vixen**
**(my personal favorite!)you can take out "Sassy" and put in anything that suits the pup...Naughty, Frisky, etc.

I have to admit that I love number 3, Lady in Red, for a nice Red and White ISD, that is a wonderful name indeed.

Countdown on the new coming litter of Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies-- 11 Days to GO!

Have a great day from the Waggy Tailed Icelandic Sheepdog Gang.

Icelandic Sheepdog Litter coming- Valentine Litter! Help Name that Litter!

2008-02-06T12:40:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well the count down as began, only Twelve Days till my baby girls Due date... Of course, its just a due date but its the first time we have had puppies due so very close to Valentine..

So its only fitting that this litter have a Valentine Thyme to it, and I thought it would be alot of fun to enlist all my fellow ISD lovers and pet owners in helping put together a list of names to look at.

Now clearly once the puppies are born, and start to get their temperments in, that will be part of the naming process but I would love to have you or your children think up some very cool names for us to look at.

So we are thinking anything to do with Valentine, we don't normally use Icelandic Names or words, so an examples would be

Greenstone Be my Valentine

Greenstone Happy Heart Waggy Tails

Now I would perfer if possable that all the names have V's in them but I am aware that it will take some work to make that happen... so let the fun begin.

You get the idea..

Have a great day from the Waggy Tail Icelandic Sheepdog Gang...

Greenstone Outlaw Josee Wales‏

2008-02-05T08:16:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Got a wonderful update on OJW, and just had to share a few of his new photos.. my goodness, is the type in this litter just stunning..what a lovely puppy, and I understand that he is very clever and is doing great in his formal training.. I am greatly looking forward to seeing him out at the shows this year.. A huge thank to his family for the update and for giving him such a wonderful home, he is a very lucky boy.

Barks

New litter has arrived......

2008-02-04T18:37:00.000-05:00

A wonderful new litter of seven has arrived, there are tan/white and Black Tri's, and they are so cute.. they are all good weights, and look very healthy...

Yes, we are thrilled to annouce our newest litter of BUNNIES..

Did I get you :)

LOL... yes, Miss Orange has had her first litter, and now has what appears to be a nice healthy litter of seven kits..

It was very exciting to peek into that big fluffy fur nest box to see what we have..

Have a great Day from the Waggy Tail Icelandic Sheepdog Gang...

Pupppies Due to arrive on Feb 18th.

Dreaming about Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies

2008-02-03T09:31:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Thanks for the lovely letters about my updates yesterday, I am so glad that folks found the Journey as moving as I did.

Well, as most of you know Runa( CERF Normal 08/OFA-Good) and Vaskur (Pennhip .39/.50 and CERF Normal, Heart -Normal) are having puppies coming in the next two weeks.

Runa is starting to get bigger and bigger, and her milk glands are getting more noticable and her belly hair is starting to fall off, she is hungry for her meals now (more small ones per day) and she sleeps alot more..always on one of the soft spots now.. and she is so snuggly, she likes to have full body massage and full body hugs, and she closes her eyes and lays her head down ever so gentle with this.. no don't stop gently touching me.. So that is how I feel asleep last night.. and so it was only fittnig in my mind that I dreamed about ? What else.. Puppies! So had to look at some puppy photos this morning.. thought I would share one with you.

Barks to all from a snowy Canada.

Icelandic Sheepdog --Getting Older--Grey in muzzle

2008-02-02T13:31:00.000-05:00

I was snuggling in a warm bed this morning, and the dogs were taking turns getting snuggles and I was cuddling Oppa and cracked a eye open and realized.. she has grey coming in her muzzle.. It seems like only yesterday that she was a young pup but in truth is was seven! years ago..and of course we have older Icelandic Sheepdogs but they don't have the grey starting yet.. Got me to thinking about this letter I had saved, and so I thought I would share it with you.

THE JOURNEY
by Crystal Ward Kent

When you bring a pet into your life, you begin a journey - a journey that will bring you more love and devotion than you have ever known, yet also test your strength and courage.

If you allow, the journey will teach you many things, about life, about yourself, and most of all, about love. You will come away changed forever, for one soul cannot touch another without leaving its mark.

Along the way, you will learn much about savoring life's simple pleasures - jumping in leaves, snoozing in the sun, the joy of puddles, and even the satisfaction of a good scratch behind the ears.

If you spend much time outside, you will be taught how to truly experience every element, for no rock, leaf or log will go unexamined, no rustling bush will be overlooked, and even the very air will be inhaled, pondered, and noted as being full of valuable information. Your pace may be slower - except when heading home to the food dish - but you will become a better naturalist, having been taught by an expert in the field.

Too many times we hike on automatic pilot, our goal being to complete the trail rather than enjoy the journey. We miss the details - the colorful mushrooms on the rotting log, the honeycomb in the old maple snag, the hawk feather caught on a twig. Once we walk as a dog does, we discover a whole new world. We stop; we browse the landscape; we kick over leaves, peek in tree holes, look up, down, all around. And we learn what any dog knows: that nature has created a marvelously complex world that is full of surprises, that each cycle of the seasons brings ever-changing wonders, each day an essence all its own.

Even from indoors you will find yourself more attuned to the world around you. You will find yourself watching summer insects collecting on a screen (How bizarre they are! How many kinds there are!), or noting the flicker and flash of fireflies through the dark. You will stop to observe the swirling dance of windblown leaves, or sniff the air after a rain. It does not matter that there is no objective in this; the point is in the doing, in not letting life's most important details slip by.
You will find yourself doing silly things that your pet-less friends might not understand: spending thirty minutes in the grocery aisle looking for the cat food brand your feline must have, buying dog birthday treats, or driving around the block an extra time because your pet enjoys the ride. You will roll in the snow, wrestle with chewie toys, bounce little rubber balls till your eyes cross, and even run around the house trailing your bathrobe tie - with a cat in hot pursuit - all in the name of love.

Your house will become muddier and hairier. You will wear less dark clothing and buy more lint rollers. You may find dog biscuits in your pocket or purse, and feel the need to explain that an old plastic shopping bag adorns your living room rug because your cat loves the crinkly sound.
You will learn the true measure of love - the steadfast, undying kind that says, "It doesn't matter where we are or what we do, or how life treats us as long as we are together." Respect this always. It is the most precious gift any living soul can give another. You will not find it often among the human race.

And you will learn humility. The look in my dog's eyes often made me feel ashamed. Such joy and love at my presence. He saw not some flawed human who could be cross and stubborn, moody or rude, but only his wonderful companion. Or maybe he saw those things and dismissed them as mere human foibles, not worth considering, and so chose to love me anyway.
If you pay attention and learn well, when the journey is done, you will not be just a better person, but the person your pet always knew you to be - the one they were proud to call beloved friend.

I must caution you that this journey is not without pain. Like all paths of true love, the pain is part of loving. For as surely as the sun sets, one day your dear animal companion will follow a path you cannot yet go down. And you will have to find the strength and love to let them go. A pet's time on earth is far too short - especially for those that love them. We borrow them, really, just for awhile, and during those brief years they are generous enough to give us all of their love - every inch of their spirit and heart, until one day there is nothing left.

The cat that only yesterday was a kitten is all too soon old and frail and sleeping in the sun. The young pup of boundless energy wakes up stiff and lame, the muzzle now gray. Deep down we somehow always knew this journey would end. We knew that if we gave our hearts they would be broken. But give them we must for it is all they ask in return. When the time comes, and the road curves ahead to a place we cannot see, we give one final gift and let them run on ahead - young and whole once more.

"Godspeed, good friend," we say, until our journey comes full circle and our paths cross again.

Peter Oleihoek Study Page 30- Icelandic Sheepdog Family Groups

2008-01-31T12:41:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks, Thought it was a good idea to show what the family groups looked like when the study was done ten years ago.. It will give you a idea of just how small all the other groups beside A1 and B23 are, now I have no doubt that some groups have more dogs in them, but in keeping with that, so have the large groups also grown.

Now the interesting things that happens is that each country has its own pools of lines, and in this way, they create their own pools of bloodlines..

Right now near as I can see, we tend to have in Canada - A1, B1, B3, H1, J1, M1, M3, O

If there are other dogs with other families, I am unaware of them, and do not mean to leave them out, please if you have a dog with a different family group, I would love to hear about it and will be very happy to add their bloodlines, please remember that your dog must have more then half of its bloodlines related to any one bloodline to claim it, otherwise, the dog carries that bloodline, and with linebreeding it could be brought out in future generations.

Icelandic Sheepdog - Interesting information about Rare Family lines

2008-01-31T09:10:00.000-05:00

More information from Monika in regards to the Peter O study and working with Rare Lines

It was 3700 dogs he started with according to my notes taken at a meeting we had with him in Denmark. I don’t know about the 4 family groups you talk about being the main ones. I think one of his first calculations gave him 5 clusters when doing a 7 generation calculation but he broke them down much smaller when he did the founder dogs and those are the family groups we talk about and have in the database. The ones you mention could be the main groups you have in USA although I do believe you started with a few dogs in the H or J groups as well (this is the Dutch group) and are still working with those groups. Now I really wish I had my computer to check this stuff but I’m using the good old paper copies I have that list all the dogs and their groups up to the year of the study. I have his original work and that’s the one I read along with the conversations I had with him and the info he gave at the first meeting after the study. I just checked the one from the website now and I found out I do have that in a paper copy as well and it does mention all the groups he found so I think the reports I have and the one on the website are pretty similar.

He broke down all the clusters he started with even farther and ended up with the following families that are used to label all the dogs in the database. Every dog belongs to one of these families but unfortunately a newer study is not finished so the dogs born during the years after the study are not labelled. A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, B6, B7, E1, E2, F1, H1, H2, I, J1, J2, J3, K2, K3, K4, M1, M2, M4, M5, O, P, Q, S, U1, V, W. He has the diagrams as well in his work as to which countries each family existed in. I do know however that even though you use a dog in a rarer line the progeny do not necessarily end up being a part of that rare line. So dogs in the A family can be slightly less related to each other (hence A1-A5, five smaller groups inside the large A group) but still stem from the same family so they are not giving us any new genetic material. A1 had dogs in all Scandinavian countries, A2 was mostly Denmark, Finland, Netherlands and Sweden if I’m not mistaken, A3 was only in Denmark and A4 in Germany and Denmark, A5 only in Denmark.

The reason for this being that the dogs that each country brought in and started breeding from in a way started their own families but within the large family group just the same. The same with B, some lines in B are smaller although B3 and B4 can’t really be considered rare (there were still fewer individuals at the time than in the A group). The other main family groups that can’t really be considered rare are H1 and J1 which are found in Holland almost exclusively (up until the past decade). Others are less widespread, all of the B lines were in Iceland with few individuals in Sweden and B5 was only in Germany. And so on and so on. During the years following the study the lines have been interbred to a much larger degree but there are still main family groups in most countries that are being bred more than others.

I do know there were 7 dogs in the 0 line though. A mother and her 6 offspring. There was one single dog belonging to the E1 family and he is gone so that whole "family" has disappeared today. There were also only two dogs belonging to the P family so it was even rarer than the O. Their mother was the only dog belonging to the Q family and she only had two registered puppies, two siblings were the total P family group. One was the grandmother of the O family and the other was her brother who only had ONE single litter in his lifetime and that was with a female in Holland (done by AI) just a couple years ago. His line is EXTREMELY important! I think by doing this combination in Holland that the O line was probably widened rather than lost, maybe even a new family has been made by that combination I really would love to know for sure. But when we view the fact that his sisters offspring were O even though she was used with a dog in the A group then it makes you wonder how a litter out of a smaller family group J1 might be clustered with this P line. So instead of these two siblings making dogs in the P family they started their own family called O. I do believe the idea of this wonderful mating in Holland is to breed these individuals back to the O line that was imported to Holland as well. I think that will be exciting to see a family line arise from that since Holland is the only country now that can breed those two lines together! We don’t even have that line in Iceland anymore.

Now it has to be kept in mind that the rare bloodlines differ greatly in phenotype to the dogs in the larger family groups and so it should be, it means the breed is genetically healthy (alot of variation) to see that we still have so many "posibilities" for differing type as well as colours etc. The problem is that most people don’t recognise the differences in the larger families that they are used to seeing and the smaller rarer lines as a good thing which is sad because they may decide not to use important individuals in breeding just because of slight faults (like HD, less good structure, finer bone or smaller stature). Often people get talked into abandoning their goal of widening the family group because their dogs become "less popular" due to phenotype and possibly people don’t want to buy a dog that can’t "compete" with the rest of the population at shows! They should see and breed the differences with the goal to possibly bring the type closer together (not to breed out the older type but to keep it and improve on faults and vice versa) but keep the genetic variation at the same time. You don’t do that by throwing out the old type and breed solely to a fashion in the show ring in my mind. There are a few very courageous people in our breed and I do salute them for their efforts which they may not see the full results of in their lifetimes. I wish I had the space and time to add more dogs to my home so I too could work on this important project but I use what I have as best I can.

I think possibly it was failed to mention the fact that in order to widen the rarer families we actually have to have higher inbreeding co-efficients in those particular lines to start with. Pieter was very clear on this point in his conversations with me, we need to linebreed them together to increase the population since the numbers of dogs available in those lines is still very limited, it’s almost like starting over again with certain lines. The low inbreeding co-efficients are of course most important in the larger family groups that we have so many more individuals and the population of those dogs are much too similar in their genetics, they have lost variation through stamping of type! I am not an expert on the subject I want to make that clear but I hope I took the right info from my conversations with Pieter when I was thinking of using my own dogs as "gineau pigs" to rarer mates (mine are in the A family group). I did ask if it would be a waste to use my dogs because they were in the bigger family group. What I remember the most is that he felt that the rarer dogs should be used as much as possible so they would need to be bred with many different lines and hopefully more with smaller lines but at the same time since very few are willing to use them then just the fact that they are used was more important than with which line and then they should be bred back to their own line to strengthen their numbers and their genes so that the larger family lines did not double up because then you lose the very genetic material you are trying to save. We can be much more picky with the larger groups whereas the rarer lines need to be used despite faults until the numbers are catching up to the other families.
Skotta the mother is of course dead now and only had that one litter. Of the 6 puppies one is dead (he had been exported to Norway but was never used) that I know of but if they are still alive then 4 remain in Iceland. Two male dogs have been used in Iceland and their one sister was exported to Sweden (I have a grand daughter of hers) and has had a few litters there. I don’t expect to see many more litters from these dogs themselves since they are already 10 years old. Some of their progeny have been exported and very few remain or are being used here in Iceland, I managed to talk the owner into one litter from a 5 1/2 year old daughter to Skolli. I hope she has more litters but I’m not sure she will since the market here is very small and her owner has a busy life and most breeder’s here are not as willing to export puppies out of the country.

I think to a certain degree that it is a bit misunderstood how many litters these rare dogs need to have in order to have enough genetic material that we actually can start to breed smarter with their lines. How else can we widen the gene pool but to use them as much as possible giving them a much larger quota than the dogs in other family lines. However because most breeders will not take a chance on their "type" for the good of the breed’s future it is very sad that we are seeing maybe one or two litters from an O line male and at the same time maybe 10-15 each from other males because they are popular. With this type of thinking the larger families keep getting larger and more threatening, making the rarer lines even smaller all the time even though there may be a few more individuals every year or two the numbers are not growing fast enough in my opinion to keep them from becoming extinct a few years down the road. We have to use some dogs in the larger groups together with these rarer individuals just in order to add to their numbers to be able to go back and linebreed back to them in future. If they are only used with one or two particular families then in future when those are bred back then you are not adding to one particular family but to maybe two at the same time and they get pretty caught up in each other and hard to seperate losing genetic variation from both lines. Does that make sense? I do know of one line here in Iceland for example that was bred to get the M3 line but it is continually bred back to the B3 line to make sure the dogs are "show type" because one particular popular stud was overused and he is hard to avoid now so the M line is being diluted because it can’t be seperated from the B line. So in that sense you need to outcross to be able to break free of the connection between the two lines.

I don’t know I am very concerned about the breed and I know you know that. Hehehe. I for one am concerned about the dilution of all the families constantly and too much mixing, and believe it is causing the popping of hidden diseases and as you say the loss of important breed traits. It is still just a theory that the faults are appearing because of this method of breeding but it started happening at the same time the outcrossing began. I feel the zero co-efficient is causing havock in the breed but my concern is more along the lines of diluting the smaller families into the larger ones because people are too concerned about keeping their type at the cost of keeping breed traits or bloodlines. People may take a chance on breeding a rarer line and then not like what they see and decide to breed back to the larger family in order to get their type back.

This is where I tend to think, and hopefully I don’t sound like I´m contradicting myself from my article and other comments about the breed, that we let dog shows have too much influence on how we breed dogs. NOW let me state that I feel we need to keep the breed type (and there are a few different ones that can still fit into the standard) structure to be able to work and special traits without losing focus on the future of the breed. Structural faults inevitably follow certain lines (and by that it could be bloodlines or family lines, I hope I word that understandably) and in order to fix those faults you need to decide whether the line is from a family group that needs to be widened before it’s fixed or if it´s from a bloodline that has more than enough representatives to keep the structural faulted dogs out of the breeding pool. It makes a big difference and is hard for those who have bred different breeds or other animals to understand that even things like HD in certain important dogs need to be overlooked in order to save the genetics of the line whereas in the larger groups you can afford to be stricter.

It’s good that people all have different opinions and fun to run them past each other from time to time that’s how we can best learn to work together. So I’m gonna go out on a limb here! J I have actually been complaining about how the breed is progressing here in Iceland over the past 3-4 years. I’m extremely worried that we are getting too consistent in type and losing good dogs that don’t fit that mould. Too much stamping of one particular type or consistency can kill off genetic variation very quickly especially when maybe one or two idividuals are used over and over again that all belong to the same family group. We have during the past few years had very few dogs used in breeding, we are losing the old lines and we are also getting more and more competitive people showing the dogs and wanting to win. This means that there are a few old bloodlines left but they are not being shown and not being used much because they are losing their appeal to breeders, the gap is getting larger and larger (the older lines were finer in bone, today you have extreme bone as everyone competes to produce thicker and thicker bone for example and on the other side of the scale some countries don’t have enough bone) too because most Icelanders don’t have a clue about the family groups study and just breed to be able to show so they see these important individuals as "dispensable" and old fashioned. Most if not all the dogs that come to dog shows today are related through two or three overused males, there is no doubt consistency when most the dogs in the ring are very closely related to each other. I for one feel it’s a sad sad time and the more these dogs are bred the smaller the rare family groups get since they cannot compete with the current fashion at shows any more than they could before which originally put them in this position of dying out.

I do agree with you (please excuse my cander everyone) that the "general type" in Iceland differs greatly from that in the US (and I do like the Icelandic type better J ). I feel that is due to the fact that you are breeding different family groups together than we are. For example we don’t have and never have had the J or H family group and we didn’t use the same individual families within the B group that were exported many years ago. Just recently we started using dogs from those family groups and the B3 and B4 have become overused here as well as I’m sure over there. On the other hand what differs from our type and your type is what family groups we are mixing together like I said we haven’t had the other lines that your population is built on. We are using the B and M family much more today but started out with alot of A family dogs. I actually think that the A family is decreasing here (probably other places as well) which also changes the general type and we don’t have dogs that look the same as they used to because of this shifting of popular lines. Sigridur mentioned after the show that she only saw a few of the "old type" which she felt was sad and she thanked the owners and breeders (I was one of them) for keeping those lines going. Linebreeding is taking place big time but in a different way than people expect. You may be breeding a low co-efficient but you are breeding from the same family groups and those dogs could all have similar "faults" and stamp the type they represent in the different "kennels" and family lines and you aren’t really adding genetic variation per se. The fact that the co-efficient is low though means it makes it easier for hidden faults to surface because you are bringing together a lot of lines that were "isolated" within certain kennels. It may be a good idea to add some of the family groups into the US that aren’t already represented in order to be able to bring in different types to "fix" what needs fixing but keep in mind that you will get inconsistency in the first few generations and work with it. These you would work as "rare family groups" in your country even though they may not be rare worldwide, it would give you easy access to dogs that can be used to fix faults and then you can breed back out to those lines you prefer to use. Whereas the rare family groups "worldwide" need a totally different strategy, they need to be bred true after spreading them about. I hope that isn’t too confusing but this is my understanding of what is best for the future of the whole population.

I too would be anxious to know how the pendulum has shifted because it seems to me that some of the family groups have in fact grown much larger while others still remain small and I believe a couple have actually decreased like the A family. Which was of course the thing they set out to do but some families still need alot of numbers to come close to having enough clout to compete in the genepool. The main rare family is still without a doubt the 0 family.

Again I hope my comments aren’t too confusing and I think that what I wrote in my article still holds true and as I say my main concern with the zero inbreeding co-efficient is the hidden defects surfacing out of all the lines and I still stick to that opinion. I know that a bottleneck is not a good thing to have in the breed and unfortunately breeders continue to make bottlenecks all the time by using few studs and popular dogs as "matadors". The fact being that all these matadors are in the same family group (mostly B3 and B4 and possibly J lines today whereas it used to be the A family) makes the situation even more critical for the survival of the rare lines in my opinion.

However as far as I know the A line is not widespread over there, I sent a couple that are half A because I didn’t know of many there at the time. Those individuals are also mixed with the M1, J1 and B3 so it’s a little bit of a puzzle to try to preserve the different lines. Like I said we don’t have data on the family groups for most of the dogs in the breeding program today which makes it hard to assess because it is not easy to figure out who fits in what group by simply looking at their pedigrees when the rarer lines go too far back it’s harder to access them as well since as you mention they can be so diluted by then. You have alot of M line dogs in North America, they make up a large part of your population so it shouldn’t be so hard to mix and match those lines back up but I think the most widespread are the B3 and B4 lines and J1. I can’t wait to get my database working again!

I think that is way too much but I got carried away...I have a habit of doing that! So sorry to those who were bored by the length of it.

Monika
http://www.tofradogs.com/

Greenstone Aris -New Icelandic Sheepdog Photo

2008-01-30T13:18:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

A huge Thank you goes out to Toki family for this new photo update.. he looks wonderful, it was taken in Dec, with the first snow of the year.. what a lovely male ISD, adore his handsome face and love the depth of red to his coat, and despite it not being shown totally, you can see that he has a very pretty curling tail

Barks

Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdog Data 2008

2008-01-30T08:23:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well those that know me well, know that I love to keep databases, and part of the fun of those data bases is getting to figure out stats (ok, the love of Stats comes with my formal education)

So for those that will find this interesting, this is the coat color/type and pattern info on the current Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies, this does not include my own breeding dogs, just the puppies.

So in coat colors right now the choices are

Yellow Gene -Ranging from a Dark tan to Dark Reddish Brown- 27%
Yellow Gene with Sable Factor -Ranging from Dark Tan to Dark Reddish Brown with Black hairs-54%
Black Tri- With full pigment on tan-11%
Black Silver Tri- With Chincilla factor on Tan markings- 8%

So in terms of Coat Length - Per the CKC Icelandic Sheepdog Standard.

Short haired:The outer coat of medium length, fairly coarse, with a thick, soft undercoat. The hair is shorter on the face, top of head, ears and front of legs, longer on the neck, chest and back of thighs. The tail is bushy and the hair length is in proportion to the coat.

Short Coated - 60% of Greenstone Puppies are Short/Med Coated

Longer-haired:The outer coat is longer than the above, fairly coarse, with a thick, soft undercoat. The hair is shorter on the face, top of head, ears and front of legs, longer behind the ears, on the neck, chest, behind the forelegs and back of thighs. The tail is very bushy and the hair length is in proportion to the coat

Long Coated- 40% of Greenstone Puppies are Long Coated.

Coat Patterns

Solid- Less then 5% of the total body has white markings- 10% of Greenstone Puppies
Tri- Typical ISD markings, Blazes/White Collars/White Socks/White Tail Tip -77% of Greenstone Puppies.
Pied- Patches of Color on a white background (think Pinto Horse)-10%
Extreme Pied-Less then 25% color on a white Background -3%

Hope you will find this interesting in some way.. I know I do..

Barks

Old Icelandic Sheepdog Photos from the early turn of the Century.

2008-01-29T14:34:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

Just out some of these old photos of the ISD.. Enjoy a glimpse into the past of this wonderful breed, I think my favorite photo is of the Kennel Ladies holding their dogs in England.. " I love how much the pretty little bitch in the middle, looks like my little Greenstone Black Pearl"

and in a very cool way of bringing someone from the past into the future.. check out this wonderful interview with Jean Lanning..

Jean Lanning
A 'charmed life' in the world of dogs
Simon Parsons talks to Crufts 2005 best-in-show judge JEAN LANNING

“I THINK I have been very lucky and have led what they call ‘a charmed life’,” says this year’s Crufts best-in-show judge, Jean Lanning.Since her schoolgirl years, the world of show dogs has been Jean’s great passion, and many years of successful breeding and exhibiting have been accompanied by a career as a judge. In this she was fortunate enough to start remarkably young; indeed she first judged more than 50 years ago, something those who know Jean’s youthful looks, attitude and enthusiasm may find hard to credit.Like last year’s BIS judge, Margaret Everton, Jean’s success in the show ring came with Great Danes – indeed it is remarkable how many prominent dog people have made their mark in, or owned, this breed. One can think of the great Bill Siggers, of course, Leslie Page, whose parents bred Danes, Gwyn and Olive Davies, Di and Carl Johnson, Karina Le Mare, Sheila Cartwright, Robin Searle, Frances and Jack Krall, Jeff Horswell and others. Even Andrew Brace owned a Dane at one time. Perhaps the skills needed in rearing and handling such magnificent dogs to a high standard give one a head start"

"Most unusual inmate of the Clausentum kennel was an Icelandic Sheepdog. They often boarded a pretty little bitch of the breed until one day the owner was having domestic problems and in desperation offered her to the Lannings, who went on to show her in unclassified classes – those were the days before the imported register. She had been bred by the Hon Mark Watson, a great enthusiast of all things Icelandic, who had imported several of the breed. Concerned about the future, he asked them to breed from their bitch, and eventually they found a half-brother who had also been sold locally. From this came a dog, Clausentum Halloween who, Jean believes, is now behind all Icelandic Sheepdogs in the world through two of his progeny sent back to Iceland in return for two more. The breed fizzled out in this country – Jean was not keen on the coats of the later imports – but has been preserved in its native land where the kennel club was set up in the late ‘60s, mainly to look after the interests of this native breed. Through Mr Watson, Jean was invited to judge the club’s first show, stopping off en route to the States, and remembers the exhibitors’ enthusiasm to learn about their breeds."

How cool is that, that Jean was asked to judge the very first dog show in Iceland and by Mark Watson himself.

For total write up (its interesting and long folks but this is the relative part about the ISD" can be found at

http://www.dogworld.co.uk/node/78

Greenstone Marquesa Esmeralda aka Fjola- A lovely Icelandic Sheepdog Lady..

2008-01-28T13:48:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Got a new photo update on one of the Greenstone puppy Crew, and so without futher adue.. here is the lovely and clearing enjoying the snow.. Miss Fjola!!

OT -Rabies found in Ontario-Not ISD related

2008-01-27T20:45:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

I know that this is not ISD related and I don't know this breeder nor do I know anyone who bought these puppies, but I am posting this on the blog, just in case someone who reads the blog, didn't see this information in the news, and I feel that we need to get the word out about this case. Please if you live in a area that your dogs are exposed to wild animals, please make sure your dogs are up to date on their Rabies, I fully support using the three year vaccine / use of Titers and not over use of Vaccines but please use the core Vaccines to help protect our beloved pets and our family members while we do so.

Date: 25 Jan 2008Source: London Free

Press<http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/News/Local/2008/01/25/4792958-sun.html>

Massive rabies case traced to local farm- -----------------------

A rabies alarm raised in Toronto has spread across the province with hundreds of possible infections -- traced back to puppies from Perth and Bruce counties.Health officials urge anyone in Ontario who came into contact with the infected puppies or who bought puppies from a Bruce County business after [3 Jan 2008] to contact their local health unit.

The deadly virus came from 3 puppies at a family farm near Newton, about 15 kilometres southeast of Listowel in Perth County, health officials said yesterday [24 Jan 2008].The Perth district health unit is contacting at least 40 people who might have had contact with the puppies or their mother at the farm."We are following up on each one of them," said Dr. Miriam Klassen, Perth's medical officer of health.Perth health officials also are urging any other people -- from friends to service people -- who visited the farm between [29 Nov 2007] and [3 Jan 2008] to contact them.

Untreated, rabies is fatal in humans.It is found in the saliva of animals and can be passed through a bite, cut or scratch.A person could catch the rabies virus simply by playing with the puppies, Klassen said.

The mother of the border collie cross pups was a family pet, but was not vaccinated against rabies, she said.After delivering the pups, she killed a skunk that was likely rabid, Klassen said.

The pups likely got the rabies from licking and nibbling their mother, she said.The mother died, as did some of the pups.The family, unaware of the rabies, sold 3 of the puppies to a dog broker in Chesley, said Drew Ferguson, spokesperson for the Grey Bruce health unit.The broker kept the puppies for 10 days.

Health unit officials have contacted 6 people who had contact with the 3 puppies, Ferguson said.The broker took the puppies to Dr. Flea's, a flea market at Albion Road and Highway 27 in west Toronto.One of the 3 infected puppies was purchased [13 Jan 2008]. The puppy became sick and was taken to the Toronto Humane Society, said investigator Tre Smith.The puppy died [14 Jan 2008] and an autopsy 3 days ago showed it was infected by rabies."We are not exactly sure how many people came in contact with this animal at Dr. Flea's," said Smith. "But we are assuming it could be upwards of hundreds of people who walked by and petted the animal."

That dog was one of at least 10 sold by the Dr. Flea's vendor that day and each of those dogs may have rabies too, said Dr. Rosana Pellizzari, with Toronto Public Health.Toronto Public Health officials issued a warning Wednesday night [23 Jan 2008]."This is very serious," Pellizzari said. "Rabies should be treated as a fatal illness -- no ifs, ands or buts.

"Officials said yesterday they have received nearly 200 calls from the public since 1st issuing the alert, and have since found a number of puppies sold at the flea market.The investigation has not found any human cases of rabies.

The infected 8-week-old puppy that prompted the alarm was bought by [a woman in] Brampton for her son.[The woman], her husband, son and brother-in-law all have to get rabies treatments, typically 6 shots in 28 days.

This case should serve as a warning to people buying pets, health officials said.Buy from a registered kennel or store and make sure the dogs or their parents have been vaccinated, Ferguson said.About the puppies- ----------------- -

The infected puppies came from a farm in Newton in Perth County. They also were handled for 10 days at a puppy broker in Chesley in Bruce County.- -

They were sold at Booth No. 1513 at Dr.Flea's, a flea market in west Toronto. The flea market booth has a sign with the name Pets R Us.

The vendor has also given out business cards with the name Feed Me More Pets and a business location of Chesley.- -

Perth district health unit 519-271-7600, ext. 267- -
Grey Bruce health unit 519-376-9420- -
Toronto Public Health 416-338-7600

[Byline: Randy Richmond and Jack Boland]

Greenstone Marcus Aurilius Photo Update

2008-01-27T19:07:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

Got new photo update on Shivers, and of course his buddy Jazz is in some of the photos. Wow, is it great to see his photos, and I am so AMAZED at how much he still looks like the twin of his sister Duchess, we had the hardest time with them as babies, it was either check the length of white on the paws or get them to turn and look at us so we could see the face blaze, and they are still so much alike.. WOW, an double WOW!

Thanks to Shivers family for the lovely update letter, and for the great photos, I got lots more then I am putting up.. Everyone enjoy seeing his new updated photos.

Barks

Ps, I could not resist, I added a photo of Duchess Face shot taken last weekend, to place it beside Shivers so you can see for yourself how much they look alike.

Greenstone Information about what Family Lines we are working with..

2008-01-27T09:14:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

In keeping with Monika's letter below, I thought some of you might like to know what family groups that Greenstone kennel Breeds with..

We are very proud that though our hard work in importing bloodlines from Iceland, Europe and in working with the finest breeders in N.A. we are breeding with A1, B1, B3, H1, and with the rare M1 and M2 lines, and last but in NO way least, we are thrilled to now have a O stud available to work with in the Greenstone Family.

We are working hard to create breedings that are starting to have the M line both top and bottom on the pedigree.

If you are interested in a Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdog for Breeding, or in our Greenstone Coming litters and would like to know what Family lines we are working with, or what that breeding or puppy has in terms of Family lines, please contact us and we will be happy to explain who has what and to explain why we are doing that linebreeding..

Sometimes it takes two or three geneations of breedings to get to the final goal of producing certain pedigree combo's and we would be pleased to explain where we are going to anyone who is interested.

For anyone that is working with the above family lines, and you are wanting to do some linebreeding on them, the Greenstone Family now has eight intact breeding males across North America that are available to approved females, health tests available on request.

Barks

Monika's Excellent Post on the Peter Oliehoek's Study

2008-01-27T09:11:00.001-05:00

This post was on one of the ISD Yahoo Groups, but as always Monika was so very helpful and it is worth having this posted on the website for more folks to read.

"I wrote an article about the breed and wrote a little bit about the “families” and my own personal opinions about the breed. I didn’t write specifically how the families were calculated but I did put a link to Pieter Oliehoek’s study in my article. Here is Pieter’s study: http://www.geneticdiversity.net/dog.html . I’m no expert on the subject but I did speak alot with Pieter at the time and have done alot of personal study of the population through the years with knowledge of the dogs used many years ago as well as dogs exported to other countries. I believed the breed’s longterm future was at stake and have personally used my dogs as “gineau pigs” to bring in new blood especially around the time of the study which has in turn kept my dogs pretty much out of the show ring since. It seems that breeding bloodlines and breeding show dogs don’t always go hand in hand! Then I found that my dogs were losing some of the traits I tried so hard to preserve so my goal has been to keep both in tact, the bloodlines as well as the breed traits. To me both are important. The question is will my dogs benefit the future of the breed by how I decide to breed them or am I just thinking about my own lifetime and how the breed can benefit me! Just a personal thought and the first answer is what has kept me breeding through good and bad.

Very quickly I think I can explain a little bit about the family groups. The pedigree info about the whole population worldwide up to 1997 was put into a special program that calculated how related they are to each other and as a whole and divides them up in families based on specific bloodlines and how widespread they are. If a “new” dog appeared (family info not available OR unknown) for example then that would constitute a new “family” (genetic variation that was “new” to the population). All the dogs that the population was originally built on were founders. On the other hand there were also dogs that were just used so seldom that their blood had become extremely rare in the population as to make them important to breed from just to keep the family bloodline alive. In Iceland there are quite a few families that are rare because we have alot of dogs that are not used often enough either because they were not shown, lived in isolated areas or because people did not think they were nice enough looking. Years ago many dogs were rarer because their progeny was never exported and some dogs who were never used and their family line has been lost. For example one dog named Garpur was his own “family” and he died without ever having progeny, he was an extremely nice dog with a wonderful temperament (hardly seen anymore), not barky or nervous and he had a nice colouring as well. Since I wrote my article I can say that I find that fewer and fewer dogs are being used and more and more people are focussing on dog shows and health tests rather than concentrating on adding genetic variation first and then perfecting the dogs and tweeking. So many people use the same studs over and over and over again on different females or related males on the same females, which is just causing the exact thing that the study was trying to prevent. The same genes are getting spread through the whole population and can’t be avoided in future breedings. As long as we have lots of different families to tap back to then we have posibilities to fix things gone wrong, but if everyone is breeding the same families and bloodlines then there is no genetic variation. The rarer families need to be used alot more, their genepool widened and isolated as well because if they are used too much within the larger family groups then their blood gets lost anyway. If you use a rarer bloodline with the same family lines that are already governing the population then you lose the rare blood very quickly as soon as those individuals are used again with the main population.

What does the M1 gene do? Inquiring minds want to know!!

So the M1 is not a gene per se, it is a group of dogs within a family bloodline that is called M1 in the study. It means that the bloodline was not very popular (could be because of not being show quality, possibly because of isolation or dogs not being used enough from this line) at the time of the study. Today that line has been used alot more and unfortunately we have no new calculation to tell us where the population is at the moment or where it is headed in general. There are still a few lines that are very rare and I´m pretty sure the rarest is still the 0 family line (which you do have individuals from in North America), these dogs are still very few and far between because the “family” started out as 6 individuals and only a few have been used but only for one or two litters each. I am breeding to that line myself and trying to keep it a bit seperate from the larger family lines. The individuals in the original 0 family were not show dogs although they were quite typical including one alspori and one with double dewclaws on three legs. The question is how important is the rare blood? Do we want to preserve it at all costs? I say yes, since once it’s gone it’s lost forever and then no tweeking can bring it back.

The show dogs in Iceland are usually all from the same few families and those are the ones that keep getting used over and over again and are being exported again for their looks. I am a little embarassed to say that most of the best dogs are actually grandpuppies or linebred to a female from my very first litter and I feel that the line is getting much too widespread. It really isn’t fair to the breed when the popular dogs are the only ones bred, alot has to do with finances of owners (how much they can spend on dog shows, tests and “advertisement”), isolation (where the dogs live in relationship to the main breeding kennels) and the general interest of the owners in the world of breeding and showing. Many very good dogs are on working farms and never come out to shows this means that by default their genes are less widespread or they are never used. We can definitely lose good genes that way. I have during the years travelled many miles to mate my females sometimes in horrible weather, at times my travels were in vain but other times I was lucky and got puppies. Then a funny thing happened the other day, I found a wonderful dog who is already 10 years old and has been pretty much “hidden” because he is just a wonderful family member who works with horses and he lives just down the road from me. Oddly enough I found it quite strange to have a usable stud so close to me. J This is extremely sad and unbelievable that even after the study people seem to be less aware of dogs that are very important, few think of what and how they are breeding in regards to genetic variation.

Some are trying to breed to a low inbreeding coefficient which is a good thing for genetic variation for each particular litter (at the same time it gives us less consistency and means that each puppy is equally important in breeding since they are so very different genetically) BUT if the dogs are both in large family groups how low is the coefficient to the rest of the population and how will it be breedable in the future? It all matters, not just numbers on a pedigree. We need variation...many different unrelated males and many different unrelated females used equally in the population. If we have litters with low inbreeding coefficients then those puppies need to all be viewed as totally different individuals. If we have litters with higher coefficients then we can pick the better of the puppies for breeding because the littermates will have alot of the same genes. This is something that most do not realize and they spay or neuter good dogs from a low inbred litter, ending up having to use a genetically less good individual because it has a totally different genetic makeup than his neutered sibling so they cannot and will not give similar puppies.

I think it is wonderful that some of you are actually asking about this study and wanting to learn more. The only thing I would say is make sure you are bringing in the right family lines to do some good in your own population and the population worldwide.

The families were named with letters, the biggest most widespread was A and in the A there were also smaller families A1, A2 etc. Then came B and so on. In the study the families were listed and the countries they were in, some countries only had the A family and didn’t know it, they just kept importing dogs that they liked the look of and didn’t know how related they actually were because they were only looking at 3 gen pedigrees. They considered all these new dogs as “new blood” but in actual fact they were breeding the same genes back into the population that they already had. Then they of course used linebreeding and such to make a specific type. Iceland had as would be expected the most families and most of the rarer lines thus giving us the most different “looks” and the genetic variation was “obvious” in the dogs. Giving the impression to some that our dogs were “inferior” but in actual fact it meant that our population was a genetically healthy one (by means of variation and posibilities for new combinations). That does seem to be changing today, we have a more UNIFORM breed in Iceland at least within the lines that are being used the most because people are breeding what they think will win at shows which means breeding the most popular dogs who are all related. Mind you some of those dogs are now from the families that used to be rarer like the M family but usually mixed with the larger families. I think that I personally like to see variation in type as well as colours because it means that when the newest fashion has gone to extremes then we can go back and fix what needs fixing. I think that any country where the dogs are too similar are probably in danger of being in a genetic crisis in 50 years or probably less! That of course is my opinion and my own thoughts on the breed, I’m sure there are many who like all their dogs to be carbon copies of each other.

I believe that USA is mostly made up of B, H and M families which of course gives you a different population and in turn a different “look” than in other countries but as with all other countries you need new blood that is not the same as you already have if you want to keep the variation in the population and at the same time keep the breed within the current standard (which is always something we have to do as well). Unfortunately my computer is down so I can’t check my database to make sure which families you have but I do know that these three are prominant.

I guess I will let that be my two cents on the subject. Just wanted to chime in and say I am glad to hear that there are people that are curious. J Like I say my computer is down so I have been having trouble with emails and haven’t been keeping a very close eye on lists. But I hope this helps explain a little bit for those interested.

Greetings from Iceland that has SNOW for a change!!!!
Monika

http://www.tofradogs.com/

Check out the Icelandic Sheepdog on Animal Planet for the AKC Agiltiy Nationals

2008-01-24T10:26:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Check out Animal Planet broadcast will be at 8 PM Eastern Time on February 10, and again at 11 PM Eastern Time. Rebroadcast at the same times on February 13 and cheer on the Icelandic Sheepdog Team!! Yahooo! Go Icelandic's Go!

New Icelandic Sheepdog orginal Artwork for my collection!

2008-01-24T09:48:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

A Warm thank you goes out to Greenstone Voodoo Child's owner for the wonderful new drawing.. most of you will remember the drawing from last christmas of the puppy playing tug of wag with the Sheep :) This year, the family and VC has been doing lots of cross country skiing.

I can't thank all my folks enough for keeping in touch and sending updates and photos of the puppies as they grow up.

Barks

Congrats to all the winners in the DIF Iceland Sheepdog Show

2008-01-23T10:12:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well, I just had to share these wonderful show photos from the lastest DIF show, these are the male class dogs, all three different classes. These photos are from Tofra Kennel, so thanks to either monika or Runar for taking them.

I will admit to being a bit surprised, I have not seen the female class, but hopefully they will have them on the internet soon, but in the males, three things that I have seen coming, where in full force in the ring this time, and that is a) all long coated dogs, where are the short coats? b) Heavy big boned dogs c)Very Spitz like in overall type.

The one thing that I LOVE!! is that we have Red/White, Black Tri, Chinchilla's and lots of stunning white markings! I am so happy to see all the colors and patterns where out in force.

Truly beautiful dogs in the ring, they all look wonderful, but its interesting to see the difference in type change over the years.

Enjoy the photos..

Greenstone Ruff Diamond aka Duke

2008-01-20T15:15:00.001-05:00

Hello Folks

New Photo of RD aka Duke for you to see his development at five and half months of age.. he is looking wonderful, great full coat, so much Ruff on his neck, that it makes him look shorter in neck then he really is.. lovely tail curl and still the most expressive of faces.

Hope you will enjoy seeing him..Don't forget he is available for adoption in the future to the right family. Please let me know if you are interested in him.

Íslandssólar Grímur- Best Male at the Iceland Sheepdog Club Show today

2008-01-19T17:46:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

I am so excited, the first time I saw a photo of this male, I loved him, then when I found out who he was, I understood why I liked him so much, Grimur is my Folda's half brother two years younger, they both have the same dam.. and he is also half brother to Tofra Dalla on the sire side, both being International BIS Ch Hektor Offspring.

Grimur had never been to shows that I was aware of, and he finally went this weekend and in a large class of ISD (over sixty at the show in total), he took Best Male, the friend that shared this info, I regret left before the final judging, so I will have to wait for tomorrow to see if he got Best in Show. I will update as soon as I have more info..

So happy for Grimur's owner and also for Bibi his Breeder!.. Also for those interested, Grimur is having his first litter of puppies in Iceland due next week!.. Can't wait to watch them grow up.

Barks

Greenstone Fire an Ice

2008-01-19T13:52:00.000-05:00

Well, we had a training session at the local winterfeast event in Riceville for Duchess, and it was a interesting trip to say the least, first she got car sick (a first for her) and that was not fun.. but once we got to the fair itself, she was great, totally herself and very friendly and responded well to my training.. but mainly, I just let her be a puppy and have lots of fun, got a meet a few other dogs, got to be petted by lots of new children an adults, got to weave in and out of crowds (ok small crowds but still a crowd), and got to see sled dog teams, and snowmobiles (that are new for her) and she was very good about it.. a few starts but good recovery time, and always the ears and tail up.. normally at the end of her leash.. Then almost car sick on the way home..so lots of little to town driving trips are in her future, because she has to get over that.. Back out to the fair for round two..came home to switch dogs and warm up..

New Odinn Photos from Alberta

2008-01-19T10:29:00.000-05:00

Good Morning Folks

Well, its a fine winter day with a light dusting of snow, mild weather at only minus 8 this morning and the flock of little bottle lambs and one goat kid are doing well in their spot in the kitchen. Another week and they are going out to their own pen in the little barn with a heat lamp.. but for now they are in easy reach for feedings and they are about like having a litter of puppies in the house in terms of clean up, so I have had practise on this :)

So got some new photos of Odinn from mom again and this time, he has his tail up and I love the moving away shot of him as it shows a bit of his structure, which is nice. He is truly becoming a very spoiled ISD at mom's from what I can tell, he is still very much ken's special boy and he knows it, and struts his stuff when Ken comes home, but he is very much mom shadow dog for the whole day.

I realized with a start this week that my wonderful Tobba is going to be seven in a matter of days.. where has the time flown, I still remember picking her up in norway and flying home with her, so am thinking of getting a new photo portait done of her, she certainly is in her prime adult look, and she loves to be bathed, blowdried and brushed, she will do the diva flip of her head and go.. "of course I AM BEAUTIFUL" now take my picture LOL so watch for that coming soon..

I will have to go to the dollar store and the clothing store to get the props I want, and then set up the photo lights etc, and start working on getting that perfect picture, then into photo shop and then to the store to print it.. I love this new age.. its so cool..

I saw another ISD owner had made a one of those photo books of your photos for 15 dollars and it looked great, so I think I might do that as well, was thinking maybe I would do one for my new litter and send it to each owner.. how cool would that be..

Well, otherwise, Runa continues to look like she is expecting and given that her belly is growing daily at this point, I think its safe to say that she does indeed appear to be expecting, so that is very cool. Talked to monika on the phone and it does not appear that little Hofi is expectin, which is to bad, I am holding out hope that she will have one or two puppies.Max's sister is indeed expecting and due next week, so sending her all my best, love this litter and think its going to make some amazing puppies!

Well, had better get my day started.. hope to have some new photos for you later today..

Barks

Judges Perspective on "Older type Dogs vs Current type Dogs"

2008-01-16T14:49:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

If I had a dime for everytime some said, "but I saw a photo of a older ISD in year XXX and it looked like this" I would be a very rich women indeed. I loved how this judge addresses this issue, because its a very valid point, the judges are to be judging by the CURRENT standard, on the dogs that are in the ring on that GIVEN day.

I think that its important to remember that any dog can do well once or twice in the show ring, but that its those with staying power that can place in Group under many different judges, that are going to be the type that will move forward in the future, and providing they meet the FCI breed standard, then finer points and tweeks along the way is well within the norm.

"What you do today, brings you closer to where you want to be tomorrow."

"In my Breed Rough Collies, the Standard here has been changed nine times since 1864.

To learn about the "Old Greats" is certainly worthwhile in ones own breed. I do not believe that this knowledge has any relation with judging my breed today.

As a judge, I am expected to judge what I see in the ring "today," and judge said animals according to current Standard.

If one had to wait until something favouring the "Old Greats" comes along, I would still be there in the next Millennium.

I know folk would like to see some breeds revert back in time? but for me what has been has been.

The clock must move on, otherwise I would be judging in a frock coat and the lady exhibitors would be struggling in their crinolines.

There should be no need for any new judge to have to study the "Old Greats" in any new breeds, they may get the wrong ideal into their heads.

When you go to buy clothes for your children, I feel sure you do not go seeking what Elvis was wearing, so it should be with judging.

Just listening all the time to "Old Timers" reminiscing can be fun, but please move into 2008 and ensure you are judging to Current Standards.

Hugh Jones(Seafire Collies) 77 years old

Greenstone Voodoo Child Photos

2008-01-16T09:43:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Ton's new, where do I start..

Well first, here are some wonderful photos of Greenstone Voodoo Child, he is a year and half old, and doing very well, has been getting lots of time out on the trails with his family, and I just love the photo of him at the beach.. what amazing photo, I think I will have to make it into a mug for my morning coffee.

Runa is doing well, she already starting to get bigger by the day, I am very excited about her coming litter.. I expect that considering that she is already starting to show, that its going to be a full litter indeed.

New CERF Exam results for 2008, I had Runa, Folda and Vaskur all redone already for the year 2008.

Odinn is still settling in at mom's and is doing very well.. still very much a love and very much a typical shadow ISD, and both mom and ken's buddy.

Duchess is coming with us this weekend to a winterfest, and will get to hang with the crowds and practise show training in a busy place, and then her first Fun match is Feb 16th, with her first major show being the weekend after.

I will try and get new photos of her when I am out..

Greenstone Mystic Moon starts her first Agility trials in Feb, so everyone send a Cheer, Don and Maggies way for the best of luck on her first trials. I promise to update as soon as I have results.

Well, that at least gives a basic update.

Have a good day Folks

Val

Busy, Busy time at the farm, Thank goodness for Icelandic Sheepdog Nannies.

2008-01-02T11:29:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Crazy busy, huge snow storms ( we have done nothing but shovling snow for weeks now) lots of work in the barns and the house etc, we have new lambs, new kids, new rabbit kits. One of the kids was rejected by its mother, and so its now in the house being bottle feed, it will be moved out in a few weeks when bigger and stronger, but much to my surprise it was Freyja that decided that she would play nanny to this little buck..

He came in very cold and weak, and she took right to him, she had just come out of heat, so I guess her mommy hormones are in full gear, but she just decided he was her's and she has taken to cleaning his face/ears and she lays in front of his box and guards it from the other dogs, she is now letting them come say hello but even when he is up and walking around, she follows him and watchs over him.

I will admit to being surprised as Freyja is a small rodent hunter, but she is so gentle with this little baby, and so I just had to take a photo or two of them together, the first one is the normal, sweet "I will groom you" and the second one was.. Oh, wait, mom has cookies and wants ears..

Well, I had better get back to work on the farm. Hope you will enjoy seeing them together.

Barks

Happy New Year from Greenstone Kennel

2008-01-02T11:26:00.001-05:00

Happy New Year from the Waggy Greenstone Gang!

Here is Greenstone Fire an Ice at five months of age, in a very pretty self-stack

Greenstone Cleo and Thunder update

2008-01-02T11:17:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Here is the most wonderful photo of Cleo and Thunder down in Calf, USA, it looks like they are already great friends, Thunder looks so grown up in this photo, and Cleo so looks in the big puppy growth stage.

Barks

Odinn Black Tri Stud -Imported from Iceland

2008-01-02T11:03:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Here is a update on Odinn, he is settling in very well at the Hickford home, He does not like to have his photo taken, but mom is still working on more photos, this is what we have so far, so as you can see, he is a lovely full pigmented black/tan and white male, he is a total sweetheart, and does very well with the grandchildren, is very close friends with the other dog of the house, little Tessa May, and has now even made friends with the two house cats.

He is a very smart and willing working dog, he learns what is allowed and not allowed within one or two times explained to him, a good watch dog that is friendly when folk come to the house, this is perfect to breed standard.

He is a very clean male (no leg liftings in the house) and travels very well in the car/truck or camper van, his favorite food in the whole world is Bacon, to which he will sit and shake while waiting for his little treat. He also loves his dried lamb treats and loves his new doggy bed.

Odinn is available for stud to approved females and will be used with Freyja for her first litter in 2008, what a exciting litter that will be, Both parents have CERF normal, Odinn has very good Pennhip scores at .44 both hips, and Freyja has a Good Prelim and we expect a OFA Good as an adult (test to be preformed before breeding of course), and we will be expecting all Black Tri's, in both med and long coat. Odinn has very strong heavy dewclaws, including a double dewclaw on his one front leg, Freyja has Doubles on the front, but we are very hopeful that Odinn will add much stronger dewclaws on the puppies.

Barks

Bed Hogs-Round Two -Icelandic Sheepdogs in Canada

2007-12-30T20:34:00.000-05:00

Here is Ch Tofra Lagsi of Greenstone Kennel with his two favorite Kitties, Sherman and TickyBoo.. Its a good thing it a queen size bed, as these three know how to hog a bed.

In this photo he is being kind enough to share his new Christmas stuffy with his mom.. so kind, now please throw it :)

Merry Christmas Hailey Pearl and Hayden Anne!!

2007-12-21T09:10:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas Everyone, I just had to share my Chrismtas Photo of my brothers daughters!!

Hailey Pearl is 2 and half and Hayden Anne is 6 weeks old in this photo..

Congrats to all my friends and Family that are expecting right now.. I can not believe how many new babies are due to be born in 2008.. last night I got a wonderful letter with yet another new baby coming annoucement.. that is... what for it.. number six due in the spring!!

We are sending our best wishes for a safe pregancy and a very healthy new baby to everyone who is expecting.

Jingle Bells..

Ch Belglen Runa of Greenstone- OFA Rate is "Good" !

2007-12-21T08:35:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Here is Greenstone Cool Hand Luke aka Olof, out for a run outside, goodness the snow will just not stop.. another half foot in the past two days..

Well, Runa has finished her heat, and so we are expecting the litter to be born around Feb 20th.. will keep you posted on how the Ultrasound goes! in a months time. Runa's formal adult OFA has come in and she is OFA Good!!! This is wonderful news, Now both of her living siblings have been tested and the whole litter is OFA Good, as is both of her Parents and all her Grandparents are tested in Iceland, Three are Fri-A and one is C. In the coming litter, it is a overwhelmingly postive mating in terms of clean Hips.

Well, I am so looking forward to the holidays, even though its just Jason and Myself, it looks like it will be a very good holiday none the less and we are planning our normal special treats for the barn critters, I make everyone treats and on Christmas morning, everyone gets health special visits, apples slices are the goats favorites, Sweet feed is the sheeps favorites, Sunflower seeds are the birds and rabbits favorites, Cats and dogs get fresh turkey in a nice warm broth..

I hope that the critters enjoy their treats as much as I enjoy getting the buckets and different treats together.

Have made my own homemade bird food this year for the wild birds and they seem to be loving it, all the recipes came from Mother Earth Magazine, but if you want to try one for Christmas, here is my birds favorite.

* 1 pound lard* 16-20 oz. crunchy peanut butter* 3/4-1 cup raisins* 3/4-1 cup black oil sunflower or mixed birdseed* 6 cups cornmeal* 5 cups all-purpose flourMelt lard in microwave. Pour into a really large mixing bowl, stir in other ingredients in order above. Pour mix into cake pan, cool and cut into blocks to fit your feeder.

Freeze in zip-lock bags.

Yields 6 blocks roughly 4" square and 1-1/2" thick from a 9x12 cake pan, and these fit perfectly into our suet 'cages'.

http://www.a-home-for-wild-birds.com/bird-food-recipes.html

This is a great site as well for information on how to make homemade bird food, just rememeber that the birds that stayed because of your food, need you to feed them all winter and well into the spring, so keep those feeders full and before you know it, you will be having to buy bird books to figure out who all is visiting your feeder, and if you are like me, it will become a high point of the day, watching the birds off and on thoughtout the day.

Duke got into something that upset his tummy yesterday so have been keeping a very close eye on him yesterday, but he seems fine by today.. was very unhappy that I brought out the pink.. but afterwards so much better and will watch him very carefully today.

Well, had better get busy on my daily chores, have a great day.. Don't forget I am still looking forward to those bed hog or christmas photos of any Greenstone dogs!! so crack out those Camera's over the next few days..

Barks

Winter has arrived!

2007-12-17T08:48:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

WOW, did we have a storm yesterday, and the wind blew from a very strange direction for us, it came from the east..and that is not normal, we got just over two feet of new snow in a day to go with what had already, the drifts are amazing.. two of my dog runs (20 feet long by 8 feet across and six feet 3inchs high, and the snow is over them.. that means that the drifts are higher then 6 feet, 3 inches.. so that will be a ton of work to dig them out. They are so bad that my husband is using the snowshoes to get to and from the barn.. yikes. We have not seen snow and drifts like this since Iqaluit.. ok, so Iqaluit was worse, we could have drifts that covered houses, but still you get the idea LOL

There was only one dog that wanted to be out in the storm for any length of time and that was Olof, everyone else would go out and come back in fast, but not Olof, he thought the storm was SO much fun.. and he would stay out and play for five or ten minutes at a time, and when he would come in, he would be covered in snow, but if you put your fingers into his coat.. he was warm and dry for the last two or three inches of coat.. no wonder he didn't care at all.. he is a furry little polor bear.. I have never seen such a thick heavy full coat on a puppy as young as him. I know that Monika asked if his coat was to soft, and I didn't think so as his guard hairs are quite harsh, and after watching him come in and go out thoughtout the day in the storm and always coming back in just as happy as a bunny.. I am going to guess that while it might be a bit soft (the undercoat anyway) that its very weather proof..

Everything on the farm came though the storm safe and snug in the barns and house etc.. well back to working outside and everyone have a great day.

Well, we finally had to have a friend come over and plow us out , took him over an hour to clear the lanes to the house and then clear the lane down to the barn.. I am so glad that he came and it was SO worth the money he charged as snowshoeing was cool but not for everyday.

A few more photos of the dogs out playing in the snow.. the top photo is of Greenstone Duke, Greenstone Fire an Ice and Greenstone Cool Hand Luke out chasing each other in the snow.

Merry Christmas from Greenstone Cool Hand Luke

2007-12-14T17:18:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas from Greenstone Fire an Ice

2007-12-13T14:28:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas....from the Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdog Crew

2007-12-13T11:12:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas from our sweet Dukem, who is still looking for just the right Pet only home for this sweet boy!

Here he is acting the little poor ever so cute puppy out of the Grinch movie.. Got to love those Atlers LOL

Icelandic Update on a Grave Matter -Duke is

2007-12-13T08:37:00.000-05:00

A Major! Bed HOG!!

I just have to write that baby Duke is the worlds worst Bed Hog!.. Somehow even though we go to bed with him near our feet and with me having my half of the bed.. somehow when I wake up.. he is on top of my head, or has his head tucked into my neck, and or he has managed to take the whole middle of the bed.. leaving only the edges for his human parents...

He sleeps like the dead and if you move him, he is will let you, with no issues, and yet somehow.. like magic within the time it takes to fall alseep and wake up.. he has wormed his little furry body back to where "he" thinks it belongs.. and he always has to sleep upside down.. belly up..

What a strange little ducky he is.. LOL

So guys, write me a story about your bed hogs, and I will share them if you give permission..

Bed Hog Story #1 -I love this photo!! Four in the air, and a feel of total contentment!

Here is a lovely Greestone Bed Hog down in the states!! So very cute, thanks for sending it.. come on folks..Get out those Cameria's and keep sending them in, and I will put them up to be shared with your fellow Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdog Family.

Herding News!! Greenstone Thunder HCT, HJD

2007-12-12T09:50:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well Breed History has been made again by Greenstone Thunder in AHBA!! Go Icelandics!

Greenstone Thunder HCT, JHD, went to a AHBA Trial this past weekend and he now has his first leg of HTD 1.. Way to go Deb and Thunder!!

Only one more leg to go and he will have his HTD 1.. very cool..

I wish I could say that there is photos but Doug was not able to make the trail and so no photos from the event.. they will see if they can get photos and video from the next one..

Happy Holidays.. Doug is getting his own Greenstone Herding Icelandic, Greenstone Cleo is joining the family! and I am looking forward to posting her own wins in the future! but most of all I am just happy that both Thunder and Cleo are happy and well-loved members of their Family.

I am also Honored as a breeder, because this is the third family that has come back in two or three years for a second Icelandic Sheepdog from my home to theirs! That means so MUCH to me, I can't tell you how proud and happy I am that my puppy owners like my dogs and me enough to come back for a second when the time is right.

I know that Jill at Pineridge had the honor this year of someone coming back for two wonderful ISD puppies, after their first Pineridge Icelandic Sadly passed away in her old age.. and of course they wanted another Icelandic.. While I do hope for my babies sakes, that its a long time coming! that I will have that honor someday in the future as well..

"Herding Trial Dog classes, with levels HTD I, II and III, take place on a standard course. All levels include an outrun, lift, fetch, wear and/or drive, and pen (the pen may be on the fence for the started level, but is free-standing for the higher levels). At the started level, the outrun is short and the handler may accompany the dog and sheep throughout the course. At the intermediate level, the outrun is longer and the handler may accompany the dog only partway through the course. At the advanced level, the outrun is longer, the handler remains at the handler's post until time to pen, and after the pen there is an additional exercise (removing a ribbon from a marked sheep). HTD trials are designed to be held in large fields, but may be held in arenas with special permission. "

Types of Breeders -Information for a Show/Pet Owners to be.

2007-12-11T10:53:00.000-05:00

I first say this wonderful page of write ups was done by Peggy D Melton, and I have used her writings as a starting place, its been modified to fit our breed and what is happening today within our different breeders.

This is purely a subjective approach to helping the newcomer understand the differences in facilities that may be encountered while searching for their next family pet, or their first show prospect There are always exceptions to every rule. Every rule except never say never or always. Let the buyer be informed. Doesn't that sound better than, "Let the buyer beware."

BACK YARD BREEDER: The BYB is disliked for many reasons. The number one reason is that they are responsible for the development of many health problems seen in common pet animals of all breeds. It gives the dedicated breeder as well as the breed in general a bad reputation. This type of person has a registered dog and thinks it would be fun, or profitable to have a litter of puppies. Perhaps they want the children to enjoy the miracle of birth first hand. Without thought to genetic problems, eye problems, hip, thyroid, skin, inherited epilepsy. The list goes on and on. They find someone else with an opposite sex of the same breed, in Icelandic, they often buy two puppies and only ever breed to those two together, litter after litter, year after year!. Obviously the only qualification necessary and they have a litter. From this hastily produced litter they then sell (if they are lucky) the puppies without imparting any knowledge on the care the little guy will need. Often because they themselves do not know. They do not explain the breed's good or bad points and when these buyers have questions and problems, they receive no help at all from the people who took their money and closed the door. Without guidance with their new charge, problems often develop and often result in owner-turn in at the local Humane Society. Abandoned or just neglected in a small dog run in the back yard, allowed to run the neighborhood, or tied to a tree. If you couldn't tell, I have little patience with this type of person.

BackYard Hobby Breeders: Now "Hobby Breeders" are wonderful, but there are a few Backyard Hobby Breeders, these are the folks that have figured out that "you" will not buy from a Backyard breeder, and they have stepped up JUST enough to give the appearance of being a hobby Breeder, they do health tests (but if you watch close, their dogs are ALWAYS PERFECT or if they do have something.. it will never bother them!), they might show once or twice a year (JUST to Say they did it), they might take a dog class or two but their dogs have no titles in any of the dog sports.

Two Big Tip Off's for this type of breeder is breeding "rare" that does not meet the standard, they have a Rare coat color, or a Rare Eye Color, or a Rare Family line or a Rare Extra Small or Extra Large examples of the breed.. the best one I ever read on the website, was a rare super large, long legged untypical color..(this dog would no more win in the show ring nor did it look like an Icelandic).. to addesss each of the rares above with an answer, here goes..

Rare colors- this means that the color is not approved by the breed standard or that its faulted in the standard and the show rings -Often the colors that are faulted by the Icelandic Standard are done so because there are related Health risks to those colors or patterns but the breeder certainly won't tell you about that part of the deal! If they even know!

Rare Eye colors- Again these would be colors not allowed or faulted in the Icelandic Breed Standard and once again, these colors were made a fault because they either took away part of what "makes" the breed type or because their can have known health side effects, but its doubtful that these Hobby Back yard Breeders know or would share with you, what those possable bad side effeect are..

They often seem to breed the "smallest or the Largest" , now I would love to tell you why they choose to do this, but the truth is the best I can figure is that they start out with inferiour breeding stock and they have the hangover from the Backyard breeder mind set of " if its got a purebred pedigree- then you need to breed it!"

The second big Tip off- Total and Complete LACK OF BREED TYPE- When you go to a good Hobby Kennel or a Good Show Kennel, in the Icelandic Sheepdog Breed you can and most likely will see both coat types (Med and Long), and many different coat colors- Cream to deep reddish brown, Chocolate, and Black Tri, in terms of Coat Pattern, you can see very little white all the way up to Peids, and all are allowed by the standard, and are part of what makes our wonderful breed.

But they should at least look like the same breed!, they should have the same general look to their heads, their body outlines, their leg lengths etc.. now each kennel or breeder might have a slightly different look then each other but what we are taking about is "Within their own kennel" the dogs should look mostly alike..

But not in a the Backyard Hobby Kennel, they will still be breeding their "Pet Qaulity" which comes in all shapes/sizes/looks dogs.. you will look at them and each dog can appear to often be a different crossbred ISD.. Even when they start keeping back dogs, you will often find that their keep back dogs will all look different, this is because the breeder has no idea what to look for and often does not care that they are producing generation after generation of pet qaulity puppies..

If you just want a pet, and you don't care if it looks like a Icelandic To the breed standard, then this is perfectly fine kennel to get a pet dog from, but I would make sure that you are only paying a much lower price for a pet quality ISD out of Pet Qaulity ISD Parents, the only thing this kennel has going for it, is that it does its health tests.

If you are looking for a Typical looking Icelandic Sheepdog pet puppy or a Show/Breeding Icelandic Sheepdog, it would do best to stay away from the Hobby-BackYard Breeders.. I regret to say that we have a number of these folks within our breed.. and I highly recommend that you keep an eye out for them and steer clear.. They are getting better in someways at hiding what they are..so you as the buyer need to become informed and make a smart choice for your home and family

HOBBY BREEDERS: The Hobby Breeder is perhaps the kind of breeder that is encountered most often on Icelandic web sites. A family that houses between three and seven dogs of either sex and has one or two litters every so often. This is a well-planned event and treated with much reverence. Their dogs are mostly kept in the house and are part of their family. They do not pursue the CKC breed ring on a weekly basis, but do go on occasion and take great pride in their wins and accomplishments in all venues of CKC/UKC competition. There is so much more than just the conformation ring. Obedience, herding, coursing, agility, therapy dogs, the list is endless. You will often find an outstanding show-prospect puppy from this type of home as they do strive to produce the best based on their knowledge. When looking for your pet, you can ask a few questions and request copies of the pedigrees and any genetic test results of the dogs being bred. It is easy to spot the difference from a Back-Yard Breeder (BYB) and a Hobby Breeder based on the answers to a few well-worded questions.

SHOW KENNEL: Another type of breeder you will see is a show kennel. A show kennel usually houses somewhere between 10 and 30 dogs at one time. This is the breeder who seriously hits the breed ring almost every weekend, hires handlers to go when they can't, and seriously advertises and campaigns their dogs to completion of numerous CKC awards. The difference here is usually the amount of knowledge and the amount of time devoted to their dogs. A show kennel breeder can quote the standard forwards and backward upon request, run down family lines at will. They can recall wins from the past and be able to equate those wins to the present as a comparison. They can discuss the current genetic problems that exist in their breed today and yesterday. They take great pride and care in the quality of the health of their breeding stock as well as in the looks. The Show Kennel Breeder as the Hobby Breeder, is deserving of your respect and your acknowledgement of their vast knowledge and willingness to help newcomers get started. This is also an excellent place to begin your search for your new puppy. Out of every litter produced for show quality, only a few of each litter will be deemed extraordinary enough to be placed in a show home, or kept as a show prospect. The others from that litter will be offered (hopefully on a spay-neuter agreement) to families that meet the qualifications of the breeder. You will get a lovely puppy that will be healthy and you can be proud to share with your friends and family. You will also get their phone number with a willing listener should difficulties arise..

PUPPY MILL: This type of establishment is the worse. At a puppy mill one can expect to find atrocious housing condition and poor nutrition of the breeding stock. Often these dogs are kept in small cages or pens and bred constantly to produce very unhealthy and unhappy puppies. These puppies are then sold wholesale to auction houses, web sites spouting several different breeds available, and pet stores where they are resold as valuable purebred CKC puppies at great costs to unsuspecting buyers. When the productive years are over, or health problem come to light, the non-productive stock is disposed of. Often inhumanely, always unfairly. This is the type of situation we hear about on the news, in many articles written in Time Magazine and other quality publications, and is the absolute bottom-of-the-barrel for ethics and kindness to our loyal companions.

PUREBRED RESCUE ORGANIZATIONS: An excellent source for a family addition. Many devoted people donate their time and money to rehome unwanted dogs with their only reward being the smile on the faces of the new families and the wagging tails as their charges finally get to go home. These dogs are usually older and have often had traumatic experiences that they may carry with them forever. A rescued dog can be a great find, but one must be careful and listen to the advice of the rescue people in regarding what to expect from this particular dog. Most all rescue people have the experience to rehab the most difficult personality problems and are willing to explain what can be expected of the new dog.

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy Photos -Foxy Brown..

2007-12-10T09:24:00.000-05:00

Thank you goes out to Foxy Browns mom and Dad for the new photos that arrived in the mail box yesterday! She looks wonderful, clearly a puppy and loving her world.. I am putting up three of my favorites for everyone to see how she is developing.

Exciting news! - Runa has started her heat so the countdown as started, will update on when she is breed, and then update on her ultrasound and then before you know it... newborn puppies!!!

She was a tiny bit early, she is on a six month cycle, and was due to start her heat on Christmas week and has started it the first week of Dec..

I am greatly looking forward to this coming litter, I think they are going to be Darling puppies..

Barks

Icelandic Sheepdog and Snow!! A winning combo

2007-12-09T09:48:00.000-05:00

This is Greenstone AJay out for a stretch of Leg.. Love this photo!!
Greenstone Cool Hand Luke "Olof" at 4 months of age, looking very fine!!

We always take a few dogs with us for chore time, and these were the lucky two that went yesterday afternoon.. I just wanted to share their photos.. Hope you will enjoy..

New Greensone Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies Photos

2007-12-07T11:39:00.000-05:00

WOW, some of these Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy Photos playing in the snow is amazing!!

Tons of new updated photos of the puppies.. Enjoy.. make my christmas folks, how about all my pet owners send me new photos of their dogs regardless of their age!!

Duke is still looking for his Forever home, here he is out playing on the deck in the snow, going for his 3rd health check and shots, he is a lovely med coated red/white/black male pet puppy.

Duke has his CERF normal, and is coming along very well in obedance and housebreaking.. he is going to be on the small side for a male, about the size of female ISD is my guess, maybe a little bigger, he is already 14 pds at 4 months of age, so a good size boy. Very sweet and Charming..for those that have meet him, he is very much like Zander in temperment

Here is a new photos of Greenstone Fire an Ice.. Enjoy..

Congrats to the new UKC Championships and wins by our ISAA Icelandic Sheepdog Friends in Washingston State.. Two new BIS by an Icelandic, Way to Go!

A huge congrats goes out to Sandi and Canadian Bred, (by Pineridge Kennels) Perla for going to the AKC Agility nationals, they did the Icelandic Sheepdog World proud!! Sunday was a very good day for them.

A amazing Congrats goes out to Katheryn and Viva (Granddaugther to another Canadian Bred dog, ARBA Ch Pineridge Elsaka CGC, UKC CD) for placing # 7th overall in the AKC Agility Nationals in the 16 inch catalog!

This was the first year that the Icelandic Sheepdog was able to compete in AKC Agility and we were so proud to have two teams be able to go this year, and they did amazing!!!

New Litter planned between Ch Belglen Runa of Greenstone by Pineridge Vaskur, Both parents have CERF Normal and Normal Hips, for more details, email isdpuppies@hotmail.com

Snow and Icelandic Sheepdog puppy Duchess

2007-11-24T10:57:00.000-05:00

Let it snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow...and then let me go play in it...Throw the ball will you, please!!!!!

Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy.... buttwiggle of delight..

Greenstone Maria Update

2007-11-20T18:15:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Got a wonderful Update on Maria Aka Rowan, she is settling into her new home well, and starts puppy class next week, I love it when folks send in photos of their puppies as they grow up and I am always so thrilled to get any updates on my Greenstone Pups..

So without further waiting, here is Sweet Maria with her new furry housemate..

Keep the updates and photos coming..

Barks

New Blog- Show Information on our Dogs

2007-11-18T09:58:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

I have had a number of folks tell me that they are looking for certain information and find it difficult to find on the blog as its very chatty. So I have been working on a few new blogs for different areas of the kennel so that folks can easily find what they are looking for.

So here is the Icelandic Sheepdog Top Show Dog Blog.. enjoy

www.icelandicsheepdogtopshowdogs.blogspot.com

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy Available

2007-11-13T10:30:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well this update is going to be mismash of info, so first, a art type photo of a Greenstone Pup on the run in the fields and the camera got the pup no quite blurry but blurred the background.. I love it personally, so wanted to share..

Training news: Zander is in Rally-O training, doing ok at it, but mom can't figure out where her feet are to go.. I can see that it will be me that has more problems then him.. was that a turn left or a turn right.. o ya, read the sign again.

I have a handling class once a week, and I will be moving who is going around, but mainly Freyja and Duchess will be going..

Puppy Classes: Well at this time, Duke and Duchess are going.. with puppy Privates for Olof and Cleo.. everyone is coming along very well in term of housebreaking and training time.

New Call Name annoucement- So Greenstone DuchessofYork new call name is Aron, and so from now on, when writing about her in a non-formal way, I will refer to her as Aron.

Maria went to her new home on the weekend, and what a lovely couple and their other dog is very beautiful and well trained, I think that Maria is a very lucky young lady, Maria's new call name is Rowen.

Show Updates and Info

Well, As most of you have seen from the blog, I have been out of touch for awhile, Man, what a busy late summer/Fall.. between the first National CISC Booster in Calgary, my Family reunion in Aug, then getting the moterhome ready and driving it out late Aug/First of Sept, then Mother-in-law visits, Mother visits, and then late fall work (garden/canning/preserves) hit hard.. and on top of that, two litter of puppies that require and demand a great deal of time, so shows kind of went to the side.. but don't worry, we have plans to get out and about in 2008.

We are planning on starting our Showing again in Feb of next year, our year goals are:

Finish Ada to her CKC Championship - Needs four points

Finish Freyja to her CKC Championship - Needs one points

Finish Aron to her CKC Championship - Needs all ten points :)

and work towards having Top ISD in Canada with either Freyja or Aron.

As far as I know, Greenstone Black Pearl Aka Freyja is Canada's # 1 Top Icelandic Sheepdog for 2007. I believe she is also Top Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy for 2007. I could not be more proud of her.

Aron's father Ch Belglen Riddari, who I believe is Canada's #2 Top Icelandic Sheepdog for 2007, and her mother is Tofra Dalla, Mother to Ch. Greenstone AJay, #1 Top Icelandic Sheepdog for 2006.. I am expecting great things from Greenstone DuchessofYork akc Aron in the show rings for 2008.

Show information and updates to follow as it gets closer.

Hip Information:

Greenstone DuchessofYork has had her Puppy X-ray Prelims on her Hips, and they look wonderful! She is starting of life with very clean hips, now we just keep on looking forward and it will be interesting to see what her adult HD rates turn out like.

This year will be the first year that we will have adult two year old results to go up against Greenstone Puppy Prelims, and I am greatly looking forward to seeing how well they match up, but am fully aware that it will take many more years of tests (at puppy and adult) to confirm and create a databank of information.

Chocolate Gene: Exciting news, I love a good proper chocolate Tri, my goodess they are good looking Icelandic Sheepdogs, Now I will admit that I don't like Dilute Chocolate tri's or Brown pigmented dogs or even cream dogs with brown pigments..

But I do believe that the "real" Chocolate Tri in our breed is important and worth preserving, so in keeping with that, I am taking the proactive step of having all my orginal import dogs tested by VetGen for the chocolate gene, (this is a recessive gene, and now can be tested with a simple genetic test) and if any of my orginal import/Foundation stock dogs come back postive, I will then start testing their offspring that are in kennel or co-owned with me.

So stay tune in the future to see all the dogs results posted, and if we have a boy and girl pop back postive, you can expect to see a breeding in the future, and maybe a full pigmented, stunning dark Chocolate Tri Greenstone Icelandic in a show ring near you!

Well in other news, Hnuks Putti aka Ulli is going to committee on Dec 5th and so we will be able to get Greenstone Born in A storm done after that, and then his litter and offspring soon afterwards.. so that is good news, but still going to take some time to get that last grandfather's paperwork done.

Planned Coming Litters- Always a good idea to get on the reservation list if you are interested in a Greenstone Puppy, most of the time when it comes to pet puppies, most of them are reserved before being born, or very shortly afterwards.

If you are looking for a Possable Show/Breeder Qaulity Icelandic Sheepdog, then Greenstone Kennel is one of the best to look at, we stand by our show record. We would be happy to send you a complete list of our Canadian Success.

Runa is due to come into heat at the end of Dec/07, and we are planning a breeding between her and Vaskur, for chincilla (cream) and Black Silver Tri, med and long coated puppies.

Folda is Due to come into heat in March/08, and we are planning a breeding with her as well. Stud to be annouced.

Then much to my amazement, Freyja is old enough and will be ready to be breed, it will depend on how she is doing in the show rings, but if she is to be breed, we are hoping to breed her to Greenstone Josey Wales.

Then comes Dalla again in late 2008/2009, and we are hoping to take her to Greenstone Voodoo Child, and for Greenstone Ada, we have our eyes on Greenstone Sharp Dressed Man.

Its going to be a couple very exciting and busy years ahead of us.. My older girls are on their last litters, and my younger girls are just starting to have their firsts.. I guess its just going to be a few years of crossovers.

Available Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies.

One Red Pied Long coated Male Puppy available for co-own, I would really like to see this guy grown out and maybe shown in the future. Please contact me if you would like more informaton.

isdpuppies@hotmail.com

Barks

Structure Evaluations- Icelandic Sheepdogs

2007-11-10T15:01:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well, went to have a outside view on the three "possable" keep backs, because in truth, I only want to keep back and grow out and hopefully show one puppy from the 2007 litters..

I was stumped on how to value different strengths and weakness on Greenstone Cool Hand Luke, Greenstone Cleopatra Jones, and Greenstone Duchess of York. How do you ever pick between three such hot bodied and sweet tempermented puppies.

But it has to be done... LOL

So the little pup that is staying with Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdog Kennel and I can't wait to get her out in the show ring in 2008, is Greenstone Duchess of York..

It looks like I have a wonderful home for Greenstone Cleopatra Jones, so she is spoken for, and I will let you know if for any reason she becomes available again.

So Greenstone is pleased to let you know that Greenstone Cool Hand Luke is available as a pet male, I would love to find a home that would consider keeping him intact but he can go to a home that would like to alter him.

Cool Hand Luke - Nickname is Olof, is a big boned, long coated med-darker Red Sable Pied, and what a handsome, an striking male he is, the only reason that he is pet quality is because, he has single dewclaws on all four legs, and I would like to keep only Double dewclawed puppies, having said that, you can show him if you want, the standard does allow single dewclawed dogs to be shown but doubles are to be given preference. Luke is so sweet, a typical male ISD, a total love bug, and he loves all peaple, this is one pup that is comfortable in his own skin.. would do well in any type of home.

Greenstone Duke of York, just had his health check up today and he is doing great, wonderful little pup, so pretty and what a striking face, and great temperment.. Duke is available as a pet puppy, and would do well in any home, loves children and is a major snuggle bunny.

Scroll down to see photos of each of these males. If you would like more photos, or more informaton about their temperment tests, their CERF tests, their health tests or any other kinds of questions about the breed or their pedigree, please just let me know.

If you are interest in more informaton or in either of these male puppies, please let me know at

isdpuppies@hotmail.com

Barks

Greenstone Empress India

2007-11-07T08:00:00.000-05:00

Good Morning Folks

Here is new photos of India for you to enjoy, what a pretty pup she is.. and I love the photo of her with her kitty friend, I can just see that kitty foot coming out to take that little chew toy away..

Love her Ying/Yang Face markings and she has just such a cute face..

Barks

Two Show/Breeding Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies Available

Planned Icelandic Sheepdog Litter for 2008 - Ch Belglen Runa of Greenstone/PineridgeIcelandic Vaskur - Reservations Recommended.

This just touched my heart and I had to share..

2007-11-06T09:40:00.001-05:00

Jason's Aunt sent this my way, and it is wonderful, she also sent along the snopes address to prove that it was real :)

http://www.snopes.com/glurge/abbey.asp

This is one of the kindest things I've ever experienced.
I have no way to know who sent it, but there is a kind soul
working in the dead letter office of the US Postal Service.

Our 14 year old dog, Abbey, died last month.
The day after she died, my 4 year old daughter Meredith was
crying and talking about how much she missed Abbey.
She asked if we could write a letter to God so that when
Abbey got to heaven, God would recognize her. I told her that
I thought we could so she dictated these words:

Dear God,
Will you please take care of my dog? She died yesterday
and is with you in heaven. I miss her very much. I am happy
that you let me have her as my dog even though she got sick.
I hope you will play with her. She likes to play with balls and
to swim. I am sending a picture of her so when you see her
you will know that she is my dog. I really miss her.
Love, Meredith.

We put the letter in an envelope with a picture of Abbey and Meredithand addressed it to God/Heaven. We put our return address on it.
Then Meredith pasted several stamps on the front of the envelope
because she said it would take lots of stamps to get the letter all the
way to heaven. That afternoon she dropped it into the letter box at
the post office. A few days later, she asked if God had gotten the letter
yet. I told her that I thought He had.

Yesterday, there was a package wrapped in gold paper on our front
porch addressed, 'To Meredith' in an unfamiliar hand.
Meredith opened it. Inside was a book by Mr. Rogers called,
'When a Pet Dies.' Taped to the inside front cover was the letter we
had written to God in its opened envelope. On the opposite page was
the picture of Abbey & Meredith and this note:

Dear Meredith,
Abbey arrived safely in heaven. Having the picture was a big help. I recognized Abbey right away.
Abbey isn't sick anymore. Her spirit is here with me just like it stays
in your heart. Abbey loved being your dog. Since we don't need our
bodies in heaven, I don't have any pockets to keep your picture in,
so I am sending it back to you in this little book for you to keep and
have something to remember Abbey by.

Thank you for the beautiful letter and thank your mother for
helping you write it and sending it to me. What a wonderful mother
you have. I picked her especially for you.
I send my blessings every day and remember that I love you very much.
By the way, I am wherever there is love.
Love, God

Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy Updates

2007-11-06T08:00:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

Well it looks like Greenstone Maria has found her new home, and she is going to be one lucky little dog, she even has a playmate of the woof kind.. The great news is that she is going to a home in Ontario, so I hope that at some point, I might get to see her again as an adult.

Well, I have had some interest in what my coming planned litters are, and the one that is for sure will be between Ch Belglen Runa of Greenstone and PineridgeIcelandics Vaskur. Mom is a med coated Chin carrying Black Tri and dad to be is a Black Silver Tri, Long Coated, so that means that all puppies should be Med or Long coated Chins or Black Silver Tri's.. Excellent clean health info on both parent dogs, and great show prospects are hoped for.

Reservations recommended.. to give you a idea of what I am expecting in terms of what a long coated Black Silver Tri looks like.. here is Greenstone Black Moon.. Now I would expect more refinement in the offspring, I will include photos of Black Pearl, I would expect the puppies to be more in type to her, but for what a Black Silver Tri looks like.. her brother Black Moon is the better example..

Now you maybe wondering what "Chin" or Black Silver Tri vs Black Tri means.. So a Chin Icelandic Sheepdog is a Yellow Gene ISD, that has the Dilute Chin Gene, which means that all "red" hairs on the body are lightened by this gene till the dog is a darkish cream color.. The Chin gene does not work on Black hairs, so if the dog is a Black tri, the tan tri markings can also be effected by the Chin Gene, (see below, Black Moon's tan markings are cream colored, as he is a Black Silver Tri, and Black Pearl's are a deep dark Tan color as she is full pigemented.)

Greenstone Cool Hand Luke

2007-11-05T11:23:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

I am so excited, The Canadian Association of Dog Trainers is finally holding its yearly three day semiars close enough that I can get to it.. I will be booked in as soon as possable to get to this seminar.

http://www.cappdt.ca/public/jpage/1/p/2008Conference/content.do

The wonderful long hair puppy above is Greenstone Cool Hand Luke aka Olof, and he is showing off his lovely long coat and show qaulity marked Pied markings, in the second photo, he is show off one of his trick commands, which is of course, Kiss, you can't see the clicker in my hand but its there.. Its such a sweet photo that I had to include it, I rarely put photos of myself up, I know this, I don't really take great photos of me, but this one was just so sweet and cute, I had to share.

The second reason I love this photo, is that Olof is showing off the wonderful breed trait of the ear fold, Icelandic Sheepdogs don't just put their ears back on their heads, they have the abiltiy to fold the ear in half in the middle, this is a very old and rare breed trait that I work hard to keep in my breeding dogs.. now I am sure you are asking.. why would you want to breed a prick eared dog with enough movement in their ears to be able to not only move around and lay down but to fold in the middle.. well in Iceland, the wind blows ALL the time, as it did in Northern Canada when we lived in Nunavut, and the dogs will fold over and close their ears off from really bad winds, now think about how great that would be.. its like having built in ear muffs for blocking wind!! to the best of my knowledge, the Icelandic Sheepdogs are the only ones that do this.. if other breeds do it, I have never found anyone yet that knows about it.

So enjoy the cute kiss photo but also see the old much wanted trait of the Icelandic ear Fold..

Barks

Greenstone Duke of York

2007-11-04T16:11:00.001-05:00

Hello Folks

Here is a wonderful new photo of Duke of York, aka Dukums.. A wonderful dark red/white, with black Mask male Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy.

Dukums is looking for a pet home at this time, he is a very small, med coated puppy, I would not expect this little guy to be a big male at all.

Wonderful curling tail, very cute foxy face, so expressive in his face, a total peaple ISD, but he loves his play time with the dogs.

Nice Double dewclaws on this tike, and of course a great temperment test and a CERF normal, but he does appear to have a grade 3 heart murmur, it has appeared to get better between his first and second puppy check up, but if you are looking at him, he would make a wonderful family dog, but given his heart, I would not recommend him for a performance dog and he must be altered and never! used for breeding.

If you are normally the person that gets their dog from Rescue or the pound but are madly in love with Icelandic Sheepdogs, then this might be the guy for you.. He has a VERY small adoption fee, mainly in place to weed out someone who would want a free puppy only, I need to know that you are committed to giving him the best home!

I think he would do well with another dog, with cats, or children or in a older folks home, and he is smart!! this is one cute and smart little by and he loves to snuggle and be a lap dog..

If you think you could offer this little guy a wonderful home, please contact isdpuppies@hotmail.com with Duke in the contact line, and tell us all about yourself..

Barks

Chris Zink Seminar - Education for Greenstone Kennel

2007-11-04T08:39:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Well, Greenstone Kennel firmly believes that you always! need to keep learning, and about all area's of Dogs, Dog health, Birthing, Raising, Training, you name it and the amount of new information coming out in regards to dogs is wonderful.

Greenstone tries to attend at min two different seminars per year, and has been quite successful at this for over eight years now, I will try and sit down and write out all the different dog related areas of Education or Training Seminars I have attended.

But yesterdays was by Chris Zink and it was wonderful, if you ever get the chance to attend her seminars, I highly recommend that you try and get to one. She is the Auther of a number of different books/Video's and she gives one or two day seminars around North America.

Yesterdays Seminar was broken down into different area's, some lecture and a equal amount hands on.. always a good thing to get to put what you are learning into hands on time..

Importance of structure to performance

Introduction to the musculoskeletal system
How to evaluate your dog’s structure
How conformation showing fits into a performance career
Understanding your dog’s physical advantages and disadvantages for performance

Body size (gigantism vs. dwarfism) and shape
How to evaluate a dog's front and rear angulation
Dewclaws and tails – their use in performance
How you can use your dog’s structure to maximize performance
Locomotion and lameness

Gaits (walk, trot, canter) – what they look like and how they are used in performance
Pacing, crabbing – why they are not ideal gaits and what to do if your paces or crabs
How to train your dog to gait on cue

Videos demonstrating dog gaits and gait transitions
The use of ground poles in conditioning and gait modification
How to determine which leg your dog is lame on and how to help your veterinarian make an accurate diagnosis

Conditioning the performance dog
Organizing a fitness program
Strength and endurance exercises
Intensity, frequency, duration of training
Conditioning for specific muscle groups
Appropriate ages to begin strength and conditioning exercises

As you can imagine it was alot of info, and tons of notes got taken but also what I came away with that were huge for me, I have already been recommending that anyone that wants a performance dog wait to spay/nueter till 14 months, but after this seminar, I want everyone to wait if possable till after 14 months, pets or not.. the amount of new studies that show overall health risks and behavioural issues with spay/nuetered dogs is amazing.. and all the studies have been done in the past six years.. there were 11 new ones, and good ones at that..

Now, I am NOT saying breed your pet dog, I am saying keep it intact long enough to have all its normal growth plates close with full hormones in its body..

The second one that I found wonderful was in regards the Body Mass index for what requirements are the best for the overall natural performance dog, and a well breed ISD to the FCI/CKC standard with the typical breed bone and weight to height, we are ideal!

This is wonderful news, and it does not really surprise me :) after all how many peaple have said over and over again, this breed is still working in the fields and show rings at 13, 14, 15 or even 16 years of age.

In a nut shell, you want a Mesomorphic build, with a Body mass index of under 2, my very sweet and very good performance females range right about 1.5 to 1.6 and my stunning performance males sit just under 2 at 1.9 But my European breed bitch being so heavy for the same height frame as my Iceland breed females, comes in at over 2, and to be fair, we have had to limit her on her choices, that is why she does not do agiltiy, she does tracking, a low impact spot..

(I want to be very clear on this, if you breed to the new AKC Breed Standard, with its change in Leg length rato, the dogs become Endomporphic in build and the fact that many of the US dogs are being breed very heavy for their heights, that when you add the two together, they no long have the same body mass index and builds that the FCI/CKC Dogs do and therefor, they get much poorer results in the scores, so if you are looking for a Performance ISD in the US, ask the breeder what standard they are breeding towards, there are a ton of great US breeders that are breeding for the FCI/CKC standard)

The third thing I learned and I am totally lumping them together is how to use the poles to train trots, and a ton of new conditioning information on how to get and keep your dogs in peek health! That alone took up two hours worth of note taking.. and I can't wait to try it out with my dogs in the very near future.

Barks

One Pet Icealndic SheepdogPuppy is available for Adoption across Canada at this time, Two Show/Breeding Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies are looking for somewhat local homes in Ontario, Quebec..

My Dogs Live Here -Poem

2007-11-02T10:12:00.000-05:00

MY DOGS LIVE HERE

My dogs live here,
they're here to stay.
you don't like pets,
be on your way.

They share my home, my food, my space
this is their home, this is their place.

You will find dog hair on the floor,
they will alert you're at the door.
they may request a little pat,
a simple "no" will settle that.

It gripes me when I hear you say
"just how is it you live this way?
they smell, they shed, they're in the way..
"WHO ASKED YOU? is all I can say..

They love me more than anyone,
my voice is like the rising sun,
they merely have to hear me say
"C'mon girls, time to go and play"
then tails wag and faces grin,
they bounce and hop and make a din.
They never say "no time for you",
they're always there, to GO and DO.

and if I'm sad? They're by my side
and if I'm mad? they circle wide
and if I laugh, they laugh with me
they understand, they always see.

so once again, I say to you
come visit me, but know this too..
My dogs live here, they're here to stay.
you don't like pets, be on your way.
they share my home, my food, my space
this is their home, this is their place..------------

Author Unknown

New Greenstone Ada Photo

2007-11-02T09:45:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Here is a lovely head shot of Greenstone Ada, out of coat, but love the expression and one of her daughter in a self-stack, A little overstressed I know but I was just pleased that she is self-show stacking so well at such a young age, love her front, and she has great bone.. This would be her non-show side, her show side as seen in photos below has much more color on it.

Two Show/Breeding Quality Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies for sale in Ontario, Canada

One Pet Qaulity Icelandic Sheepdog Puppy for Sale in Ontario, Canada

Barks

Greenstone Duchess of York

2007-11-01T17:30:00.000-05:00

What a stunning little pup this is.. Clean coat- No Black hairs in her coat, and she is at least to me, the spitting image of Grandma Tofra Frigg.

Love this little gal, what a sweet temperment and so quiet and calm but bright!

Greenstone Icelandic Sheepdogs has Available Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies for Sale at this time, both Show/Breeder prospects and Pet Puppies.

Greenstone "Cleo"

2007-11-01T16:10:00.000-05:00

New photos of Cleo, and lots of puppy updates, the pups still at home and looking for Show/Breeding local homes are starting puppy class next week, and zander is doing well in his new Rally Class, and Freyja is rocking in her Show training Class.

Two Icelandic Sheepdog Puppies Available for adoption at this time, we are looking for Show/Breeder homes within the local general area of Toronto/Ottawa/Montreal..

One Pet puppy that is available for adoption across Canada or the US.

Greenstone Outlaw Josey Wales

2007-10-30T18:14:00.000-05:00

This wonderful big fluffy boy is now at his new home in Ontario. I look forward to watching him grow out, and seeing him in the show ring in 2008.

Greenstone Foxy Brown

2007-10-30T18:11:00.001-05:00

New Photos of Foxy Brown in her new Ontario home.. I look forward to seeing her grow up..

Greenstone Marquesa Esmeralda- settled into new home in Sask

2007-10-30T18:05:00.000-05:00

Esmeralda is doing well in her new home in Sask, Ontario.. We will look forward to photo updates of her growing up.

Barks

Greenstone Marcus Aurilius - Doing Wonderful in his new home

2007-10-30T18:00:00.000-05:00

New Photos of Greenstone Marcus Aurilius, Aka Shivers. Shivers is doing wonderful in his new home, and nothing so far but good reports from his new alberta family.

Watch for new photos, as this amazing handsome boy keeps growing up.

Barks

WOW, Where did the time go and finally back online!

2007-10-30T17:50:00.001-05:00

Finally back on line, Don't even know where to start.. how about after being gone for alot longer then expected (due to needing to get different parts fixed on the motorhome finally got home late fall ) and have been running and dealing with life ever since.

The best news is that more of my orginal ISD's finally got their CKC numbers, I can't begin to express how happy this makes me, also good news that Hnuks Putti will be going to CKC committe Dec 6th and hopefully shortly after that, we will have his new CKC number and can move his son's and grandpups registeration forward.

I think I will make a number of different posts to try and get caught up.

Barks

Dalla's Girls new photos

2007-08-29T08:17:00.000-05:00

Dalla's daughters are a nice looking group. From top to bottom are the Duchess of York, Marquesa Esmeralda, Empress of India, and Imperitritsa Maria. All but the latter went over to investigate the chickens at one point, and I'm sure Maria would have joined them if she hadn't been napping.

Dalla's Boys new photos

2007-08-29T08:03:00.001-05:00

At the top we have Duke of York - or just Duke - and below we have Marcus Aurelius. Both are very outgoing, with Marcus being among those who wandered over to check out the turkeys and chickens during the photo-shoot.

Ada's Pups, New Photos

2007-08-28T20:29:00.000-05:00

Hi folks,

When Val's away, the puppys still play, and it's up to me to see if I can post a few pics for you all to enjoy.

From top to bottom, we have Cool Hand Luke, Cleopatra Jones, Foxy Brown, and The Outlaw Josey Wales. These little ones enjoyed a few minutes on the lawn before going inside for a snooze. Their tails are beginning to curl around, and all are quite happily devouring scrambled eggs when the opportunity presents itself. If they see or hear me coming their way, they all come a-running...

I'll try to have some pics of Dalla's pups up tomorrow...

Calgary Puppy Groups Photos of Greenstone Black Pearl

2007-08-25T22:38:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

Still waiting for my Winning Show Photos to come from Calgary but got two reasonable show photos of Black Pearl in the ring in Puppy Group, so thought I would share, this was Saturday, after she had just taken Best Puppy and Reserve Winners Bitch at the first National Canadian Icelandic Sheepdog Club Booster in Canadian History. What a amazing win for a little 11 month old puppy to do.

I will be doing a full write up on the first National Club Booster for the History of the Breed in N.A. area of the Blog in the near future.

Barks

New Photos and Puppy Update

2007-08-25T22:22:00.000-05:00

Greenstone Apollo and Greenstone Black Moon, playing Tug
Greenstone Thunder, looking like the sweetest, fur rug, I have a photo of his great-grandfather in the very same pose and they look so much alike, it amazes me..
Greenstone Thunder in a lovely stack, looking ever so happy and healthy.. as always a huge thank you goes out to these dogs wonderful owners and families, thank you so much for sending me updates and photos and thank you for loving your dogs and making them part of your families, it means a lot to me.

Puppy updates, starting solid food this week, ears are up on almost all the puppies, tails are up and starting to come over the backs, Duke's tail is already starting to curl over. All the puppies are enjoying Grandma V's company very much and think her lap is a excellent place to take a snuggle and a puppy nap in. The puppies are getting much more out time in different area's of the house, and are starting to play with toy's this week as well. Outside time is a daily event and is much loved.. today it rained to much so new toys and a good romp in the living room was in order.

Photo updates to come in the near future.

Barks

Happy Greenstone ISD water play

2007-08-21T12:09:00.000-05:00

Ada Son's new photos

2007-08-19T18:01:00.000-05:00

The little men of the family, say.. hellooo all, we are growing up fine, and wow, our first trip outside and the lawn needs a good trim ..

Ada Daughter's photos..

2007-08-19T17:43:00.001-05:00

Say hello to the world little girls.. o so pretty...

New Ada Litter Photos

2007-08-19T17:27:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

New Ada puppies photos along with little Duke, healthy as a horse but going to be a small male I believe, but man is he cute :) Enjoy the photos..

Barks

New Puppy Photos of the Dalla Litter

2007-08-19T17:11:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

New Photo's of the Dalla puppies enjoying some fine weather outside, a bit of play time and all ready for naps. Finally starting to look like little dogs :) and check out those amazing prick ears already! The puppies are looking wonderful, more photos coming soon. Duke is being raised in the Ada litter, so that each mother is nursing five, so his new photo's will be coming with that litter. Nose's are starting to become black..

Barks

Greenstone Sharp Dressed Man Photo

2007-08-15T18:46:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

Ok, so I am behind LOL but wanted to share this lovely birthday photo of SDM with you.. thanks to his family for sending it..always wonderful when the owners keep in touch and send me updated photos..

Barks

Fun Photos from the CISC Eastern Fun Match

2007-08-15T18:42:00.000-05:00

CISC Eastern Fun Match Photos

2007-08-15T18:37:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks,

A huge Thank you goes out to my puppy owners that came to the CISC Eastern Fun Match with Judge Monika K from Iceland. A great time was had by all, and lots of laughs and smiles and tons of presents made for a fun day for all.

Enjoy the photos and a few more yet to come.. look for the full published results in the coming fall newsletter from the Canadian Icelandic Sheepdog club.

Barks

Ada litter photo update

2007-08-14T09:46:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

The puppies are doing great, Foxy has one eye open already!! and they are big and healthy and growing, growing so fast.. Enjoy the new photos..

New Dalla Litter Photos

2007-08-14T09:41:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Eyes are open, starting to waddle, and starting to come over for love and cuddles, everyone is growing and doing well.

Show Update on New "Ch" Belglen Riddari

2007-08-08T11:45:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

New win photo of Ch Belglen Riddari coming soon, till it arrives, I am using the win photo from Ontario taking two weeks before the first National Booster event for the CISC and Icelandics.

Riddari was finished in very limited shows, three weekends in total, taking Best of Breed Five out of eight days of shows entered. Ch Belglen Riddari had earned six points in ontario, and finished his Championship in style in Calgary at the first Canadian Icelandic Sheepdog Booster, by taking Best of Breed for a five point win. Congrats to Sharon at Belglen Kennels for showing him in Calgary as Breeder/Owner/Handler.

He went on to take Best of Breed on Sunday of the show, and also on Sunday his Litter sister Belglen Risna took BOS, and they are both Littermates to Ch Belglen Runa of Greenstone, the first female CKC Champion in Canada. Risna is a international Champion as well. It is fair to say that the litter has done very well indeed. For those interested in the bloodline, Ch Belglen Riddari is the father to the two current Greenstone litters on the ground and Ch Belglen Runa of Greenstone is going to be breed this winter for a coming litter. Two puppies are still available for reservations at this time, and we are taking reservations on Runa's planned litter to be.

He was not at the AKC show on Monday, as Sharon needed to head home, but with two Best of Breeds over the weekend and high placement on Friday, he had a very good weekend indeed.

Barks

Greenstone Black Pearl - AKC Show Results

2007-08-08T11:14:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Win photo is coming, it in the mail and coming by CD..So on to the show news

Greenstone Black Pearl took Best Puppy in Breed all four days at the AKC show.. Go Freyja!

Her big win was Reserve female on the CISC Booster event on Saturday, she was able to hold her own against a good size class of all older, more mature females, and I am very proud of her taking Reserve female as a 11 month old puppy, can't wait to see what she can do next year as more mature female.

Barks

New Litter #2 Photos

2007-08-08T11:07:00.001-05:00

Hello Folks

A few more photos of the Ada litter's puppies, four puppies in total, two females and two males, more updated photos coming later today, these guys are doing great! Momma dog is very good, and they are growing fat and are O so colorful and pretty, wow do we have some intersting "flash" in these two litters, and of course more in the next email about the show but just a bit of a brag on Daddy, of these litters who in very limited showing, (total four days) finished his CKC Championship, and in the first National ISD Booster in Canada took Best of Breed for a Five Point Major. Considering that Ada is littersister to Greenstone AJay- Top Icelandic in Canada for 2006, and that Ch Belglen Riddari is the father, I think its safe to say that we will have some amazing Icelandic Sheepdogs in these two litters, and for all the little ones that go as loving pet, I would imgine that you will be so very pleased at just how typical and pretty your babies will be!

Barks

Week old Dalla litter Photo Updates

2007-08-08T11:01:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Eyes are starting to open, Hubby has promised new photos today, so will update even more soon, says he could not get a good one of Duchess in this batch of photos. We have one smaller male puppy that is healthy and doing well but not growing at the same speed so we will see what happens. Everyone else is growing like big and it sure shows..

Barks

New Greenstone Litter #2 has arrived -Ada/Darri are Proud Parents

2007-08-02T12:33:00.000-05:00

Hello Folks

Just a quick note, Ada has had four puppies so far, and all look wonderful, Jason will do photos and updated in the near future.

We recommend reservations if you are interested in a Greenstone Puppy. Between the two litters we have eight puppy applications with deposits, so as we have ten puppies, we are open to two more puppy applications.

Breeder Mom and Greenstone Black Pearl are off to the dog show this weekend at the AKC.

Wish us luck.

Barks

Greenstone Marquesa Esmeralda

2007-07-29T12:52:00.001-05:00

Emerald( Esmeralda means Emerald in Spanish) is our lovely extreme pied Female Puppy, she is a very Dark-Red Sable and white girl.. She has lovely double dewclaws on her back legs and large strong singles on her front. Emerald has the same ying and yang face as her mother Dalla, and I am looking forward to seeing her develop in the future.

Due to the fact that the CKC and FCI Icelandic Sheepdog Standard, clearly says that white can not be predominat, Emerald will be looking for a wonderful pet home where she will need to be altered and be a much spoiled love of someones life.

Barks, Cuddles and Puppy Breath.

Greenstone Regina Margherita

2007-07-29T12:41:00.001-05:00

Margherita is a stunning Med-Dark Red and White Icelandic Sheepdog, she ooze's being female, she is a very refined female, she has lovely white face markings, collar, white socks and white tail tip, a very pretty typical Icelandic Sheepdog Markings. She is a med coated female. She has Single Dewclaws on all four legs.

Barks, Cuddles and Puppy Breath

Greenstone Imperatritsa Maria

2007-07-29T12:33:00.000-05:00

Maria is a very pretty light med red (or I believe she will continue to lighten and is in fact a Chincilla but time will prove me right or wrong ) female, she is a very nice female, l love her head, bone and substance, she has a full white head going right back into her large white collar, this is allowed in our standard providing her pigment comes in fully. Maria has single dewclaws on all four legs. Her pied pattern is very striking and your eye is drawn to her and her lovely sister India.

Barks, Cuddles, and Puppy Breath