Marjut

Marjut´s family had always owned dogs; when she was born they had a carelian beardog, after that a smooth collie, but the first one she remembers well was a golden retriever bitch, Alexa. When Marjut was around 12-13, she started to go to one kennel during weekends to help and to spend time with dogs. Soon she got to go to her first dog show, and she thought it was the greatest hobby ever.. One of the first shows was an unofficial show, where Marjut participated to the Junior-Handler -competition with a borrowed husky. As a total rookie, it wasn´t really an outstanding performance, but still today Marjut is certain that there was something wrong with the judge, not her performance. It was actually Jouni, who was judging.. Lord knows if he felt such a huge pity for her, or if he truly loved challenges, but he offered to teach Marjut how to show dogs.

So, all she needed was a dog of her own that she could take to shows. The kennel she went was breeding siberian huskies, but Marjut´s mom wasn´t a big fan of the breed, so she made her choose something else.. Naturally, a whippet was a close choice?! (A bit of teenager -logic there, perhaps..?) So, she got her first own dog in 1991; a brindle whippet bitch called Puhurin Shawanah, Wanda. She was a nice dog and sure, Marjut got a bit excited about the shows: during 1992 she counted that she visited about 40 shows, and if you look at the results, it wasn´t really anything to celebrate over; 4 CQ´s, yippee.. Well, no-one can say that she didn´t try or wasn´t enthusiastic enough..

So, okey, Wanda wasn´t a beauty queen, but Marjut had decided to become a breeder, so she bred her first litter 1993, at the age of 15. Wanda turned out to be a nice mother, and produced puppies that were nicer than herself, and so far Marjut believes that all together it was the best whippet -litter she bred. Unfortunately Marjut lost Wanda during 1999 to a head-tumor. She bred another whippet litter during 1997, and the last one on 1999. It also appeared that at least some of Jouni´s advice had gone through, and after a while Marjut also showed dogs for others; mostly whippets and other sighthounds, but also siberian huskies, some toybreeds, some terriers etc.

Besides breeding whippets, Marjut went to school, and after she finished studies she and Jouni moved from Finland to Norway to work there for a few months, and finally ended up to Sweden, where Marjut works in an american IT-company in a management -position. We found a nice house from Sweden, so finally it was suitable for us to get a husky of our own! 

Most (=read all) of the sparetime goes with the dogs. We don´t have any kennel facilities, but all of our dogs live in the house with us, sleeping in the bed and drooling by the dinner-table :) During the days they have about 300 m2 fenced area to play at.
We breed in a very small scale, a few litters/year. 

We live in the countryside, on the west-coast of Sweden, in an area called Munkedal, nearby a tiny town called Hedekas. It´s fairly close to the Norwegian border.

Jouni

Jouni got his first own dog at the age of 9; a german shephard -bitch. But, it wasn´t until 1985 he got actively involved in the dog-world. That year Jouni got a red saluki-bitch, Ch. Al Sarab Harizza, "Rizza", and thank´s to her, Jouni found a new hobby in dog-shows. It didn´t take for long until he had already learned how to show most of the breeds, and was showing dogs for others as well. During early ´90s he was showing succesfully breeds like siberian huskies, newfoundlands, salukis, australian cattle dog, mudi, welsh corgies etc. And a whippet; Marjut´s Wanda. But we don´t really use the word 'succesfull' when describing that...

In 1991 Jouni got involved with a new breed, that was pretty different from his saluki; newfoundlands. He liked them a lot, and ever since he has actually been a happy owner of a newfie.

Since Jouni was handling a lot of different breeds, he also got involved with siberians, and even bred 2 litters of them.  In 1995 he had the opportunity to borrow a super-famous siberian male from Spain to Finland. It was Artic-Blue´s Senator, "Red". Red had a succesfull visit, alltogether he won 6 Best In Shows, and finally ended up 6th on the Dog of the Year (all breed) -list in 1995. In 1996 it was time for another visitor; this time it was a Swedish newfie -male; Ch. Qashiwas Coastguard, "Boy". In 1997 Jouni had another guest star from Spain; Ch. Artic-Blue´s Lady Stentson, "Mandy". Mandy was actively shown for only 3 months, but still she ended up as 9th on the Dog of the Year -list in Finland -97.

In Rovaniemi -show, 1995, Jouni met Kerstin Einarson (kennel Qashiwas) in the Best In Show -ring. He was there with A-B. Senator, who went BIS, and Kerstin had a newfie -male, Ch. Pouch Cove´s Patriot of Cayuga, who went BIS-2. Jouni was impressed by the gourgeous -newfie, and few months after the show he contacted her to ask for a puppy. In the end it turned out so that Kerstin was interested in huskies, so they decided to switch puppies. That is how Jouni got a very special dog; Qashiwas Here I Am, "Börje", who moved to Finland in the beginning of 1996 to live with Jouni.  Börje turned out to be such a special character,  that Jouni relized that newfoundland truly is THE breed for him, and they will always be a part of his life.

In the end of 90´s Jouni also studied for a while, and then we moved to Sweden, via Norway in 2001. Due to our hectic work (We work in a same company both having leadership positions), it was difficult for a while for Jouni to breed any newfie -litters, but 2006 he finally got a litter of 2. Instead of having puppies at home, we have borrowed our Nanna to our friends, but her next litter will be born at home. In the future we are concentrating mostly on our siberian husky -breeding, though.

We have also had one guest star at our place here in Sweden; in 2002 we had an USA-imported siberian husky -male, Ch.Kristari´s FireLitByChipsAhoy,"Pentti", staying with us for almost a year. After Pena, the next guest was Sokota, though she sort of stayed... Then it was time for Chanel's son, Duque, and he's sort of staying as well.. Soon it could be difficult for us to borrow any dogs :)

Jouni has been breeding a couple of litters of siberian huskies and newfoundlands under the prefix Thalizzmazz. In April 2008 he gave the prefix to our dear puppy-buyers, Agneta Tapper and Erik Skott, and became a co-owner of Bedarra.

[Puhurin Shawanah, 'Wanda']

[Ch. Al Sarab Harizza, 'Rizza']

[Ch. Qashiwas Here I Am, 'Börje']

[Ch. Qashiwas Coastguard, 'Boy']

[Ch. Kristari's FireLitByChipsAhoy, 'Pena']