ISSR Shiloh Shepherd Leonidas

February Hutto IABCA Show!

2012-02-09T23:27:00.001-06:00

Well we headed down to Hutto this past weekend to hit the shows! Leo ended up taking Best of Breed in shows two and three, but the competition was fierce for Group and Gold Cup and we didn't get any ribbons...this time! ;)

It was overcast and most of my photos didn't turn out, but I got a few. Of course I couldn't get any of the adult Shilohs in the ring because we were in there too! Hope you enjoy the few shots I did get. :)

Below, Kyrie's brother Chester! Chester took Best of Breed in show one. :) I only wished I'd been able to get a better photo of him--but he kept moving!

Joyce and Alan also brought their other boy, Travis! Travis is from the Venus/Big Jake litter. He really resembles his dam...except for that HUGE wide head of his! That is pure Big Jake!

Blair brought her two boys all the way from Louisiana! Here is the extremely handsome Torren, hanging out in his crate. I love his face and he has a wonderful friendly temperament! Torren really never met a person he didn't like. :)

Blair's younger boy, Killian, is just a pup still! He is from the second Laska/Timba litter, brother to the very handsome Jaxx. :) Here he is soaking up the attention and hanging out in his crate. Getting a shot in the crate was difficult because he kept coming over to me to see what I was doing!

Blair tried to stack Killian for me but he wasn't having any of it!

...until he got in the ring, that is. Then he stood like a statue! A little more work and that boy will be taking home some ribbons! Here he is competing in Herding Group:

Along for moral support was Blair's mom with her new Shiloh pup from Solace! Here is Mato from the Asia/Aslan litter. :) No show is complete without a super-cute pup to get all the attention. ;)

Thanks for looking everyone--I hope you enjoyed our photos!

Summertime Leo!

2011-07-15T11:52:00.005-05:00

It had been a while since I got some new photos of the boy, so early the other morning (while it was still ONLY 85 degrees outside!) Leo and I had a photo shoot! Above, he's doing the handsome over-the-shoulder pose; below, he's getting his running in before it hits 103 degrees!

Pretty profile shot!

THERE'S that pesky frisbee! As you can see, our frisbees are all rather abused.

Alert face!

And a Leo in the sun! Thanks for looking, everyone! Hopefully we'll have some new show photos for you this fall!

MAC Show, June 2011

2011-07-15T10:28:00.011-05:00

Unfortunately Leo wasn't able to come to this show with me--but that was okay, because I got to show his sister, Ginger, to two Best of Opposites awards! We always joke that Ginger and Leo look a LOT alike, so everyone probably thought I was showing Leo anyhow. ;) That's her lovely face, above, and below she's resting with one of Michelle's other girls, Jolene, in the x-pen.

The BIGGEST puppy (yes, still under a year old!) at the show was definitely Bravo, from the Shamira Shilohs Tanna/Shadow litter. Look how huge this monster boy is! He won a well-deserved Puppy Best In Show at this event.

Winning his Best in Show:

Taken standing next to some handy humans for size reference:

Olga working with Bravo before ring-time:

Though Bravo was biggest, one of the CUTEST pups at the show had to be April's new boy, Cutter, from the Snow/Bear litter!

What a foxy little face!

And a nice profile...

Cutter and April in the ring. What a happy puppy!

There were lots of pups at this show--it was great to see the upcoming generation! Three of them were even Ginger's pups, from her litter with Kuma--Thor, Ender, and Bronte. Here's Thor in the ring:

And doing an awesome Rally demonstration for us--just try to beat me, big dogs!

Ender being a lap puppy--getting too big for that!

Ender scoping out the possible playmates...

He found one! Cutter and Ender playing. :)

Olga posing her beautiful Bronte for me:

At the end of the day Ginger and Kuma and their kids got together up on the hill for a family photo!

Another puppy who came was Meesh's Gracie, from the Ruffy/Malone litter. She obligingly posed for the camera. :)

Finally, there was another Gracie puppy who couldn't make it. Michelle's new little Gracie girl from the Snow/Bear litter broke her toe right before the show! Here is a photo of her with her mom...more on her later!

There were also some awesome adults who attended the show! Evie brought her Shadow, Yoshi and Scout's brother.

The Magnificent Iso, Leo's half-brother, posing for me outside:

Iso's profile. What a majestic boy. Can't wait to see how his pups with Shawnee turn out!

Iso hanging with his favorite people, Shani and Mike. :)

The lovely Hemi looks more and more like her daddy Buckshot every time I see her! Here she is in the ring:

And posing with the judge after her wins!

Michelle's Jack (also Leo's half-brother--they share the same dam) was just over a year at this show and had his work cut out for him competing against the two and three year olds! But he gave it a great shot and was a joy for me to show. Give this boy another year or two to mature and I think he'll give 'em a real run for it! Here he is looking up at me--what are you doing, Auntie Anne?

Jack's profile. Such a handsome boy!

Michelle's Jolene, sitting pretty for me. By the end of my visit Jo was my new best friend!

Often I think the candid shots I get at the shows are better than the posed ones. Here is a wonderful shot of Margaret with Piston. I love how he looks at her. :)

Pistol Pete performed at the top of his game this show and walked off with an Adult Best In Show! I love his facial markings--they remind me so much of Kyrie's, even though they aren't any closer than very distant cousins. :)

And finally, after the show I got to spend a few days with Michelle, Don and the dogs at their lovely home. We picked little Gracie up from the vet and took her to lunch with us. Here are some more photos of her from that outing. What a face!

Posing pretty with her human momma in the big chair:

Thanks so much for reading, everyone! Sorry for the lag on these photos. Next up...new Leo shots!

Dayton, OH IABCA Show, Part 2!

2011-02-03T08:24:00.008-06:00

In this second set of photos from the Dayton IABCA show I got some great size comparison shots with one of our dogs next to GSD's in Group categories. Above, Piston next to a GSD. Note the level back instead of sloping, the squarer proportions, and the tremendous size difference. If the GSD was looking ahead you would also be able to see the difference in expression with Piston's small, triangular, Shiloh-correct ears next to the taller GSD ears.

Below you can see him compared also to a White Shepherd.

Here we have Jan's Tanna, only five months old in this photo. She is standing next to a young GSD who is ten months--double her age!

Mindy's Yoshi in the ring, Show Two, being examined by the judge.

Mindy's lovely Starr in the ring, looking alert!

A block of shots of the adult girls in the ring. They are, from left to right: Shawnee, Starr, Bisou.

I really love Shawnee and she was very photogenic for me! Here's a sweet candid shot I missed for yesterday's update:

And a block of shots of Shawnee in the ring:

Jan's beautiful Shanna in the ring, as lovely a five-month old Shiloh girl as you will ever see! And the judges agreed, awarding Shanna a slew of Best in Shows and Best in Specialty Puppy!

Best of Breed competition, Show Two. The dogs are, left to right: Piston, Yoshi, Bisou, and a dog I don't know. Piston took first in this round and went on to Herding Group.

A few shots of Piston in the ring. Can't tell I like this boy or anything! Though apparently the judges agreed with me!!

Piston in the Group competition.

Moose sitting while the judge takes notes. Moose is littermate to our Kyrie.

A block of photos of Farrah in the ring (she's to the left of the White Shepherd and GSD). Such a sweet girl, with excellent movement! Farrah was almost 18 months in this photo; the two other Shepherds were similar in age. You can see the size and structure differences here again.

Best of Breed class, show two. Piston is also in the ring, but out of the frame, and ended up winning!

The lovely Bisou in the ring. I loved this girl--a sweet personality and excellent sound structure.

Thanks so much for looking--I hope you enjoyed out "ring shots"! Stay tuned for the third update, with photos from our Specialty!

Dayton, OH IABCA Show, Part 1!

2011-02-02T13:46:00.008-06:00

This month Leo and I decided to be completely crazy and drive the sixteen hours to Dayton, OH for an IABCA show! Jan of Shamira Shilohs also organized a Shiloh Specialty show for us there, and we had EIGHTEEN Shilohs in the ring! It was fantastic! Here's a shot of The Gang, hanging out. We took up pretty much a whole wall!

The good news: I got photos. The bad news: The lighting was terrible! Apologies for all the blurry shots. :( We had to use no flash to get anything, so the movement shots just didn't turn out. That said, I did get some decent shots--like this great cameo of Piston, who really hit his stride at this show, with three Best of Breed awards AND a Best In Specialty!

I'll be splitting this into three blog entries. We'll start with the shots I'll call "candid"--just people and dogs, hanging out!

The charismatic Hemi--if only I could have smuggled her into my car!

Jan's Shadow, Leo's uncle, side shot:

Jan's Shadow, a portrait: so photogenic!

Jan's Shadow--with an extra set of ears!

Leslee's Sasha, such a beautiful girl with a wonderful temperament!

Mindy's Midori, ready to give a kiss to anyone who greeted her!

Sweet Farrah, bashful about me taking a photo of her with her latest medal!

I didn't get any pictures of Colt, but I did get a photo of "his" baby, Erik. The Shiloh Family did a fantastic job keeping Eric entertained while Rachel was in the ring! Here, Leslee wheeled him in his stroller until he finally fell asleep!

Hemi and Piston, waiting for the next show:

Treasure and Guido, getting ready for the ring:

Jan's lovely Shanna. In the background, Bisou telling her mommy that she loves her!

Bisou. Sadly I had the flash on for this one!

Moose and Guido hanging out:

Bisou, and Sir Tylar catching a nap:

Sir Tylar's back--just could not get a good photo of that boy all weekend!

A couple of Bravo, from the Tanna/Shadow litter. His ears were awesome!

Here's Z and Linda, outside of the ring at the Specialty:

And Bisou, all tired out! Thanks for looking everyone, I'll have more photos up--this time, shots of the dogs in the ring--in a jiffy!

Color Changes From Pup to Adult

2011-01-11T15:05:00.003-06:00

A while back I posted some new photos of how dark Leo had gotten since his puppy days. Well, there have been lots of questions about how colors change as our dogs grow recently on our Shiloh Shepherd Friends forum, so I thought I would do up a comparison picture. You can see it up top. This may also help people who are looking at a Kyrie/Leo puppy understand how dark even a light-looking pup can get!

If you would like to see a larger version, please click on the photo. I love seeing old photos of Leo as a baby...he has changed so much, but his puppy expressions are just like his adult ones!

Happy Third Birthday, Leo!

2010-11-20T20:55:00.006-06:00

Well I'm a bit late with this (I know, I know, I'm TRYING to get better!), but Leo turned three on October 12th. :) I've put together some updated photos of he, his littermates, and his parents! You can see photos from the first time I did this back in 2008 here, in this blog entry for his first birthday!

Below are a couple shots of Leo's brother (the only other boy in his litter), MC. MC's human mom Anne was nice enough to take some beautiful photos of the handsome MC for his birthday! You can see MC and his Shiloh housemates (Kola and Grissom) on Anne's new site, Diamondwood ISSR Shilohs!

Leo had only one smooth litter mate, the beautiful Nana--so different from the rest of her sibs, with that lovely pale silver coat and dark markings around her eyes!

Leo's sister Sunny has coloring that's a lot like their sire, Acer, though she is darker. We are so proud of Sunny for her Best of Opposites win at our CSSC Chapter Specialty this year! Here she is posing with her human mom Liz and judge Fred Lanting. The second photo is my favorite "Sunny hiking" photo--Sunny is lucky to live in gorgeous Colorado, amidst the mountains and snow! Leo is jealous...he wishes we had more snow.

Leo's sister Ginger is almost his twin! They look so much alike now that they are mature that we tease Ginger's human mom, Michelle, that she must sneak into our house and take pictures of OUR dog when we are not looking! Here is my favorite Ginger photo, taken last winter by Michelle. You can see she is also lucky to live where it snows!

Finally, I wanted to do something I have not done before, which is post photos of Leo's sire and dam. We had a photo of Acer but had never succeeded in getting a good one of his dam, Holly. But this year, Karen Ursel was gracious enough to take a lovely photo of Holly for us to use on the litter collage for Leo's first (upcoming) litter! So here they are, finally, Acer and Holly!

We hope you enjoyed Leo's latest birthday retrospective!

CSSC Shiloh Specialty In Oklahoma, June 2010

2010-09-21T13:00:00.008-05:00

Late with the updates again! Not quite as bad as last year, though. I'm improving! Lura, our Chapter President, took the lovely photo of Leo you see above the day before the show. It's my new favorite photo of our boy!

In early June our local chapter of the SSDCA (Shiloh Shepherd Dog Club of America), the CSSC, organized a Shiloh Specialty Show at the Riverwind farm just outside of Oklahoma City. We had a wonderful turnout, with NINETEEN wonderful Shilohs and their families attending from as far away as Nebraska, Colorado, California, Arkansas, Arizona, and Louisiana! WOW! One of our LB's, Laura Kathryn of Solace Shilohs, came down from Washington State, too! Below, you can see the ring being set up:

I took a LOT of photos (of everyone else's dogs, of course...I can always take pictures of my own!) and will share them here. First off, below is Grand Victor and International and Breed Champion Big Jake with his son, The Duke! Ken drove all the way from California to hang out with us and to see Jake's sons and daughters: BJ, Junebug, and Batman.

Here is BJ in the ring, nicely showing her teeth:

And a couple of the handsome Batman:

And Junebug in the ring, with her sister behind her:

One of Big Jake's other progeny also made it to the show: Travis, from the Venus/Big Jake litter! Travis is The Duke's littermate. Here are some photos of Travis in the ring:

And here is Travis (left) with his housemate, Chester (right)! Chester is our Kyrie's younger brother, and took BEST IN SHOW at the event!!

Having a couple issues with uploading photos right now, so I'll add to this later. Stay tuned!

Leo's Color

2010-07-23T12:37:00.004-05:00

On our Shiloh Shepherd boards, Ma (our breed founder) made a post that there have been lots of questions about sables and duals and how our dogs change color from when they are puppies to what they look like as adults. Sables will often darken, sometimes dramatically! If you click on the right sidebar on the 2007 posts, you will see what Leo looked like as a puppy. The photos above and below are what he looks like now! Apologies for the photo quality--we were outside after a rain and I snapped these with my cell phone. :)

When Leo was a pup, we thought he was a golden sable. Now I think he might be a dark brown sable. They change so much, often it is hard to tell!

Dog Days of Denton, June 2010!

2010-06-05T17:14:00.004-05:00

Dog Days of Denton this year was pretty lonely, with only Leo to hold down the fort! Our Shiloh friends were at the Tulsa IABCA show, getting themselves some ribbons; Thorn had a sore paw; and Kyrie had just gone into heat the week before, so bringing her wasn't going to happen. Nonetheless, we had a great time! Above you can see Leo and Zak, posing behind our table. This year we had our usual trifolds, "You've Met Leo!" cards, and a flyer about Shiloh Size, Hips, and Temperament. We also added a flyer about Shiloh Rescues and Re-Homes, since we are always in the rescue section of the festival and get lots of enquiries!

Above, Zak talked to one of our booth neighbors about Shilohs after Leo greeted her. Below, Leo putting on his "Majestic Leo" expression. He enjoyed being out and about with his humans for the morning! In the background you can see the marked fields where they were running flyball and disc dog demos. We were in a great position to watch, and picked up some discs for the dogs to play with at home!

Below is our booth neighbor, the "Barkery" Dog Bakery! Her home-baked dog biscuits were AWESOME! Our dogs especially loved the "Beefy Beagles" and "Piggy Pugs" and "Peanut Butter Paws". I told her she needed to add some "Cinnamon Shepherds" to go with her "Great Danishes"!!

We had more than a few shepherds and shepherd mixes stop by to say hello to fellow shepherd people! Below, a German-lines GSD, who was very confident and friendly (but really, REALLY wanted to get those frisbees away from the disc dogs!).

And the absolute sweetest shepherd mix we ever met--she was a husky/shepherd mix. Look at that great deep silvery-gray color! She was a big ham and really liked my camera! I couldn't resist feeding her a few nibbles of our Beefy Beagles biscuits (don't tell Leo!):

About the time it hit 95 degrees Leo decided that he was a giant lap-dog and that if he just sat on Zak long enough, we would take him to some air conditioning! We gave in and did take him home shortly after. The heat was brutal this year!

Unfortunately it was pretty busy and I didn't get more photos. But we had a great time, and would encourage anyone in the neighborhood to come out and enjoy the fun next year!!

Catching Up - Homecoming, August '09 Part 2!

2010-06-05T16:33:00.006-05:00

Okay, here's our second set of photos from Homecoming 2009--if you'd like to see the first set, scroll down to the entry below this one! ;) As I said there, I get sad that we don't have more photos of some of the Shilohs behind our current dogs, so now when I go to shows I take pictures of as many of them as possible!

Without further ado, here we go! On our New Zion tour I got a great shot of Lucky, peeking out of his kennel door!

Sometimes when you're shooting the dogs going around the ring you hit the button at the weirdest moments; here's Koda in mid-treat!

And another shot of Koda, being judged by Lisa and Olga:

Here's Leo's litter-brother, MC--such a handsome boy, with the dark coloring I love!

And here is MC again, with his puppy "brother" Grissom from the last Star/Tango litter:

Here is Penny, from the Snow/Blue litter. She's littermate to Ella "Boots", who you saw in Part One of this update:

And Nova, one of our favorites since he was a little pup--now I think he's taller than Leo!

Wanda and her girl Misty were in the pop-up next to us and shared some AWESOME duck and sweet potato treats with our gang!

Famous Mira, who went on to land a role in the new "Red Dawn" movie with her uncle, Shadow!

Here is a head shot of Teddy, Leo's half-brother, from the Spirit/Acer litter. Teddy and Leo used to look like twins! Leo has since darkened a lot more. Teddy is one handsome Shiloh, and took a Best in Show at Homecoming this past year!!

Here is Sparky, a truly lovely bi-color girl, trying to tell her handler that she can surely run herself around this silly show ring!

Here is Olga's Orion, who passed away this last year. We caught him in "sleepy mode"--it was warm enough that a lot of the dogs were dozing in their x-pens!

Here is one of my favorite photos! Shawnee (one of the Maggie/Rufus girls) is beautiful, and I love how friendly and eager she is in this photo! Thank you for posing for me, Shawnee!

And one of Shawnee standing:

Linda with her Zephyr (sire of the upcoming Yuki/Z litter!!):

And finally, we were very lucky to meet Ursa, Leo's great-granddam on Acer's side!

Thanks so much for looking--remember, look down below for Part One and more photos of gorgeous dogs!!

Catching Up - Homecoming, August '09 Part 1!

2010-06-05T16:20:00.002-05:00

All right, last real "catching up" post and then I can actually get to stuff we did THIS year!! In August of 2009 we rented an RV for the first time ever and road-tripped to Homecoming in style--you can see Kyrie lounging on the couch as we drove, below! We got to camp out on the grounds at Willard's, and decided that we loved cooking and camping out with Shiloh friends (even better when you have air conditioning...yay for the RV!). We learned a lot at the Licensed Breeder meeting and took a TON of photos...of everyone ELSE'S dogs!! The photo above was taken by Jolanda and she kindly sent me a copy. Thanks so much for catching Leo and Zak accepting Best Plush Male of 2009 AND Leo's National Select award, Jolanda!!

Without further ado, here are our photos of everyone else's lovely Shilohs. I tried hard this year to get as many photos as I could. Often I am saddened that there are not more photos of dogs whose names I find in our ISSR pedigrees. They were very well-known when they were showing, but now it is very hard to find photos. So I resolved to take as many as I could, and I managed to get quite a few for the first couple days, at least. It always seems that you run out of steam--or get way too distracted!--later on. I'll try to label all of the dogs in the photos when I can, and I'll do it in two batches. Here we go!

We usually try to go to New Zion for the tour early on, before everything gets so busy! This year I had the presence of mind to take photos of some of my favorite dogs. :) Below, Blue was nice enough to let me get a great profile shot of him in his run:

And Acer was out front, very disgruntled that we'd intruded on his latest "date":

THIS time I even remembered to get a shot of Leo's mom!! Here is Holly, who was such a sweet girl. She was unsure about my hat but let me get a marvelous profile shot of her beautiful face. :)

And finally, that beautiful little pup from the previous year has grown into a lovely lady!! I think this is Grizzla, out in a private run in the garage. I think she was a Gem/Acer pup? All of us were lusting after her in her puppy photos!

Zeus, below, is Holly's brother--which makes him our Leo's uncle!

On the subject of handsome smooth boys, here is the amazing Buckshot, giving us a smile:

Earlier I had a photo of Blue. Here is his daughter, Ella "Boots", in the ring:

And here she is, asking if she really has to go back and run AGAIN:

And on the subject of hot Shiloh guys, Kyrie informs me that I had better put up this photo of Leo's half-brother, Iso. Apparently he's on Kyrie's "hunk" list. I wouldn't be surprised if she's printing out this photo in poster form to put up in her crate right now!

And a head shot (can't tell I really like Iso either, huh?):

Here is Sheila with the lovely Joy, who has won so many awards that I, slacker that I am, can't even recite them all:

Here is our friend Carla with the always-handsome Ender in the ring! Ender is Leo's half-brother:

A few more in-the-ring photos, from Friday I think:

And we will close this entry with a gorgeous upstate sunset!

We hope you enjoyed our photos—check back soon for another Leo update!

Catching Up - CSSC Meet 'n' Greet, October 2009

2010-03-15T21:31:00.009-05:00

Once again I have been the laziest blogger ever, and Leo and Kyrie are sick of me not putting up all of my photos of them and their friends! So in a grand attempt to catch up I'll be posting a metric ton of photos of "what we did between June '09 and March '10" here on Leo's blog. Don't worry--Kyrie and Thorn's blogs will get updates, too!!

In October of '09 we arranged to have a local Shiloh Shepherd Specialty Show at the Oklahoma City IABCA show. The evening before, we all met at the Riverwind kennels farm (Deb and Mel's place) for pup playtime, drinks and dinner, conversation, photos, and an auction to benefit our new local chapter of the Shiloh Shepherd Dog Club of America: the CSSC!

Once again we had a great turnout, with people coming from as far away as Arizona and California to visit! Most of my photos are of other peoples' dogs (well heck, I can photo my own any time I want, you know!). I'll give a running "who's who" commentary for those keeping score! For those who want to see photos of the show itself, please head on over to our Picasa Album: 2009 OKC Sooner Sieger and CSSC Specialty!

And now, on to the photos! One of the great things about this gather was that several puppies from the Katie/Big Jake litter got to see each other again--with their mom and dad!! Katie lives at the farm, of course, and here is a lovely photo of her being obligingly beautiful:

And another of her COMPLAINING! "Mom, what are all these people and dogs doing in MY YARD???"

And here is Katie with a bunch of her pups--now a lot bigger!

Big Jake showed up and glared at me every time I tried to take a photo of him. What can I say, the big guy knows he's good-looking, he doesn't need to mug for the camera!

Who on earth could have spawned all these gorgeous bi-color dogs? Could it have been...Katie and Big Jake? ;)

Some more specific photos of a couple of the Katie/Big Jake littermates! Here is the lovely Moriah, sitting:

And standing:

And flirting with Leo! Doesn't he look bashful?

And here are a couple of the handsome Batman!

Other Shilohs attending were Ender from Arizona, Kyrie's brother Chester from Texas, and Ken's Sako, who provided the puppy antics for the gather (SO CUTE!). Here are some photos of them. First, Chester:

Now, Ender:

Ender kept trying to drink from everything. Apparently living in Arizona makes you really thirsty!! The fountain:

And apparently he thought that dogs should be able to get a drink from this as well as humans!

And here are my photos of Sako, who was all legs and tongue and ears and was just about the cutest thing you'll ever see!

In the midst of all this, Mel grilled us all some tasty dinner! Thanks so much for being our hosts, Deb and Mel!

I tried to get a lot of photos of the long view on the back lawn, so you could see all the people talking and Shilohs running amuck! Deb and Mel's back lawn is fenced so we could let the dogs run loose. They loved it!

I hope you've enjoyed the update--stay tuned!! Next up: Homecoming photos!!

Catching Up - Hutto IABCA June 2009

2010-03-15T20:57:00.008-05:00

Well I have been lax beyond belief with the blog entries but it's time to catch up! There is a lot of ground to cover, so I'll just jump right in with the pictures (I know that's why you guys read these dog blogs anyhow!). ;)

We had a great turnout for Hutto--especially considering that the first time we went we were the only Shilohs!! Deb and Mel from Riverwind kennel brought their girl, BJ, from the Katie/Big Jake litter. She was just a little pup in these photos but she tore up the ring with all her wins!! Between winning multiple best Bred-by-Exhibitor awards AND winning in the standard shows, she ended up taking Best Smooth Bitch Puppy of the Year, awarded at the 2009 Shiloh Shepherd National Specialty!!

BJ looking up at her human mom, Deb: "Do I really have to go run around the ring again?"

BJ enjoying a Frosty Paws treat. It was so hot inside the building that Zak brought all the pups Frosty Paws!

BJ stacked pretty! I tried to get stacked photos of all of the dogs, though I missed a few. One of these days I will learn that it is impossible to find the time later in the show, so I need to get my photos early!!

And finally, we decided that BJ can sleep anywhere!! She spent most of the two days of the show snoozing in her crate, even with all the barking and hubbub and noise!

Kyrie's "little" brother, Chester, also attended the show! I neglected to get a stacked shot but I did get a couple of good head shots. You can see how much he and Kyrie look alike, with the eye markings and the white "bib" on the front of the neck!

Carla brought Ender all the way from Arizona for the show to get some more points toward his Puppy Championship!! Ender is from New Zion's Angie/Acer breeding.

Here is Ender getting a drink from a squirty bottle:

Ender in a nice show stack:

And Ender relaxing in his PUP tent between shows!!

Ender's littermate Neiko was also at the show! What a handsome gray sable boy. This was his first show and he behaved like a pro! Here he is with his human dad:

And here is a great stacked photo of Neiko:

BJ's brother Kaiser was also at the show. Here he is being stacked (well, mostly) by his adoring human mom, Sheryl!

Christina Tanon and her dad brought their boy, Bruno! Bruno is out of the New Zion Stacie/Warba litter. Here he is in a lovely stack:

And looking at the camera, wondering what I'm doing:

And a great close-up profile of his head (I think that Bruno is very handsome, just in case you couldn't tell!):

And finally Bruno lying down, relaxing between shows.

At the end of it all tons of fun were had and plans were laid for Homecoming in New York for some of us, and a gather in October for the OKC IABCA show for others! More on that in the next entries--but for now, I leave you with a photo of pooped post-show pups!

Leo's Graduation!!

2009-07-01T10:00:00.003-05:00

Hey everybody!! Leo has some great news for his fans. :) Last night he graduated from his Obedience class...but he ALSO graduated from his Therapy Dog class!! Leo is now certified as a Therapy Dog and will be making his first visit later this month!!

Below you can see his awards for graduation: our club president hand-embroidered his name on his bandana, he got a patch for his Therapy Dog vest, and he got a certificate. We are so proud of Leo!!!

Dog Days of Denton - May 29-30, 2009!

2009-05-06T11:17:00.004-05:00

Heya everybody!! We are so pleased to announce that Leo and Kyrie (you can see her blog at http://hobogirlkyrie.blogspot.com) will be at Dog Days of Denton, coming up at the end of this month! Even better, we have purchased a brand-new, super spiffy BANNER for our MEET THE BREED booth!! Most of the pictures are of Leo because that is what we had--we are a very small Chapter and only a couple of other people sent pictures. But we think the banner is great anyway and we hope that when we make our next one our Chapter will have grown!!

It has been a lot of work to put this booth together and we hope that tons of people stop by to see Leo, Kyrie, and the other Shilohs who will be showing up! This event typically draws about 9,000 people so it should be a great opportunity to promote our beloved breed. :) You can see the banner up above--we can't wait!! Hope to see you there!!

Leo's Excellent Adventure, Day Four!

2009-05-05T16:25:00.006-05:00

Day Four dawned bright and clear and Leo finally seemed to have his mind on his game! We went into the ring for Show Three and he ran well, stacked nicely, and flirted with the judge! In fact, she looked at me and noted, "Well, he's full of himself, isn't he?" and laughed! I apologized but she said, "Oh, no, I would MUCH rather have one like this!" Well, we were certainly off to a good start there!

But doom was lurking...doom in the form of a twelve-week-old puppy! Leo and Ender went into the ring for Best of Breed. Leo and I went in first...then Carla and Ender followed. But apparently Ender had decided that he was going to sabotage us! He bounced in and BARK BARKed at Leo--and when Leo looked at him he did a HUGE PLAY BOW! Well, needless to say, Leo was a wreck for the rest of the round. All he wanted to do from then on was PLAY! We saw a lot of evidence of those "secret kangaroo genes" that our breeder's trying to hide! Below you can see how it went--Leo trying to turn around, and Ender back there on the right edge of the photo, acting like an innocent little angel!!

But Ender's tricks thankfully came to naught. The judge noted that she was glad she'd seen Leo run well before the puppy came into the ring, and that she was giving Best of Breed to Leo on the basis of maturity. Which just goes to show you--in the future, WATCH OUT FOR THAT PUPPY!! He's smart, sneaky, and gorgeous, and if he fulfills that potential he is going to be a juggernaut at the shows!!

Our luck was changing, though, and without a pup in the ring trying to get him to play, Leo did end up getting a First in Herding Group! We went on to Best In Show competition--first for Rare Breed BIS, which we did not get anything in, and then in overall BIS--where we pulled a Reserve Best In Show ribbon!! YAY, Leo!!! You can see a picture of us in the ring for all-breeds Best In Show below!

Below are some more pictures from Day Four. We have Leo relaxing in his crate--he seemed to want to be close to my jacket!

Sunny and her friend Cupcake trying to figure out the weird noises the lady with the camera is making:

Liz and her Sunny sitting pretty!

Leo smiling for the camera, putting on his "movie star" face:

Leo and Ender were really tired by the end of the day!

When the day finally wound down, Ender had won three Group placement medals, Leo had his blue and white Reserve Best in Show ribbon, and everyone had had a wonderful time visiting with old friends, making new ones, and spending a beautiful Arizona weekend together! As we got up at 4 a.m. to leave for Texas the next morning, it was raining in the desert. I got a pic of rainclouds coming down over hills, and a farewell shot of the last set of mountains before we left them behind.

I hope that you've enjoyed our chronicle of the Arizona road trip. We enjoyed it so much, we are already wondering if we can do it again next year! :)

Leo's Excellent Adventure, Day Three!

2009-05-05T16:04:00.003-05:00

I FINALLY got a few moments to update Leo's blog with all the pictures from the show back in March!! Above is my absolute favorite. While I was in the ring running around with the dog, I had asked our friends Carla and Michelle to see if they could shoot some photos for me with my camera. One of them caught a GREAT shot of Leo headed around the turn in the ring--you see it here up above!

There are so many pictures...get ready for a long post on this one!! As usual, just click on the photos for the bigger versions.

First off, you may remember that the first day of the show is NEVER Leo's "good day"! He is always so bouncy that he is useless his first show. Remembering this, we'd skipped the first show of the day in the hopes that by the time I got him down there for show two he may have worked off some energy. NOPE! Instead, we got our butts handed to us by a really cute little puppy!! Here he is with his proud owner, Carla, in puppy Group competition:

And below you see him looking up at us with the deadly "Cute Face" that he used to charm the judges ALL WEEKEND! May I present Ender, truly a force to behold! He is also Leo's half-brother; they were both sired by Acer. :)

Now we need to put up some pictures of Leo's sister, Sunny! They are littermates. You can see how much Sunny loves her human, Liz, and how much Liz loves her Sunny!

Here they are running in the ring! Sunny has beautiful movement; she really gave Leo a run for his money! One judge made us run around the ring together several times because she just couldn't decide who was better!

So Day Three passed and Ender was victorious, beating Sunny in Show One and both Sunny and Leo in Show Two! How would it go the next day, we wondered? Would Puppy Cuteness reign supreme?? There was only one way to find out!

Leo's Excellent Adventure, Day Two

2009-03-11T12:29:00.005-05:00

When we finally got to my parents' house we hit bed pretty early (thankfully there was a small spot of actual green grass down the block for poor Leo to do his business before he exploded!). The next morning it was time to explore...and for some quality time with my brother's KIDS! Lauren is almost five and little Graham is not yet two years old. Leo had been very good meeting them on leash the evening before, so I decided to let him loose with them that morning while I kept an eagle eye on the proceedings. I needn't have worried, as it turned out--Leo, usually the bouncy crazy dog, was very careful around the little ones! He let Lauren brush him and give him obedience commands, and Graham and he took turns following each other around the house. After the initial shock of meeting such a BIG dog, both kids got pretty fearless with Leo!

My parents have a beautiful desert-landscaped backyard. Leo really enjoyed exploring, though the plants were a little unfriendly for him! Here are some shots of Leo the Desert Dog. Just click on the pic for a bigger version!

Let's Explore!

Ow, this one's pointy!

And that one is prickly...don't they make normal plants here??

Can you find the Leo in this pic?

The obligatory Cactus Pic, sadly it turned out a little dark:

After playing with the kids and exploring the desert-scape, Leo got some much-deserved nap time while all the humans went for a canyon cruise to celebrate my mom's birthday! The landscape was beautiful but no dogs were allowed on the boat. Sorry Leo! I took some pictures anyway; a few of them follow. Arizona is a much greener state than most people realize!

As we ended a wonderful fun and relaxing day, Leo and I prepared to get up early for our next bit of fun--the IABCA Desert Sieger dog show in Tucson!! Stay tuned for show pictures of us...and many friends!

Leo's Excellent Adventure, Day One

2009-03-11T12:08:00.006-05:00

So a few weeks back the Tucson IABCA show was brought up on the Shiloh Shepherd Friends forum, and I'd been feeling like a road trip ever since gas prices dropped. Michelle, who owns Leo's sister Ginger, was going to be there, and Liz, who owns another Leo sister, Sunny, was thinking of going too! Add to that that my brother and his family were visiting my parents in Phoenix for my mom's birthday and VOILA! In no time we were registered for the show and before we knew it, Leo and I were off on a cross-country adventure!! Above is Leo after his grooming appointment, complete with snazzy purple bandana; below is a sleepy Leo in the car just as the sun came up, a few hours into our trip!

Now Leo has always been pretty fussy about where he chooses to "do his business" and we have run into some marathon sessions where he just would NOT go because he wasn't comfortable in the place we picked out for him. But this trip would tax Leo's picky bathroom habits more than any other. Horror of horrors, we realized several hours into the trip that there was NO GRASS! No green grass anywhere! And what "grassy-type vegetation" there was was BITING GRASS! Everywhere poor Leo thought he might like to relieve himself he found nothing but sand burrs, horrible little sharp pods that dogs pick up between their toes. They are hard and sharp and they even hurt you when you pluck them out from your dog's foot! After the second attempt to find a nice spot of grass, Leo just gave up. He did around ten hours of the trip with no place to piddle!

I was worried about my poor dog, who was also not too interested in eating or drinking. So I distracted myself with scenery! I got pretty adept at pointing my camera out my window when we had to go really slow for traffic or construction and snapping a pretty pic of the terrain. The trip out seemed to take forever (it was sixteen hours total) but when we saw our first mountains it was all worth it! Living in the north Texas flat country has really made me appreciate how beautiful the desert mountain landscape is!

As the sun set on our long day on the road we were only a half hour from my parents' winter home up in Phoenix. Leo had no idea what was in store for him...but the picture below contains a hint!!

Best in Show!!

2009-03-02T12:17:00.003-06:00

We got Leo's Best in Show photo in the mail and I managed to take a decent digital pic of it. You can tell we were tired because the silly dog kept shutting his eyes!! And the photographer must have thrown something because he was leaning back, too...oh well. :) It's still a good photo and we got the judges in this one!

Speaking of judges, I thought I would post here my synopsis of the judges for this show and what they seemed to like in the show ring. I first posted this on our Shiloh Shepherd forum. You can see the entire discussion from the show here. I would also like to THANK all our judges for their great advice, encouragement, and feedback!!

Okay, here were the judges for our show, for future reference because I know they judge IABCA shows elsewhere (and one of them was a licensed FCI judge too).

Show #1: Ms. Judy Bennett, who made sure to tell me "you have done amazing things with this dog in only three shows" and was one of the judges who awarded us our BIS! Future reference: She likes to see our dogs GO! Trot 'em as fast as you can with as much lead as you can. She was the one who said "To the Shiloh with the REACH!" with a big smile!

Show #2: Ms. Luane Williams, who reminds me so much of Tina it was funny! A real no-nonsense, down to earth type, she made me run Leo a couple times to get it right...or at least better! She was the one who asked me if Leo was the same dog she had noticed in the other ring, and who shored up my confidence by telling me he had run better with me--without her comments I think I would have been much more "down" on myself after my first show with Leo. A very amusing thing is that she lives near us, and used to teach at the Obedience club we are taking Kyrie to right now (for Kyrie's blog you can look here) For future reference: She countermanded the other judge and asked me to take Leo around a little slower so I could keep better control, which worked to override the "top secret kangaroo genes"!

Show #3: Ms. Jane Roppolo, the UCI-licensed judge, the one who gave us our third place in Herding Group and one of the ones who gave us our BIS! She was soft-spoken and was very thorough and hands-on--she ran her hands down over Leo's back, sides, and flanks and spent a lot of time feeling for the structure beneath the fur. She's an old hand at the dog game but she seemed plenty charmed by Leo and Bruno's shameless flirting with her! When she was writing us up after the breed judging Leo nudged her pen hand and she said, "Look what you made me do!" and held up the clipboard in front of him with the scribble on it. And got a big nose print on there for her trouble! For future reference: This is another judge who wanted me to give Leo his head so she could really see him move. I think she's co-owned show dogs from more breeds than the AKC even recognizes!

Show #4: Ms. Julianne Kowalsky was THE Shiloh enthusiast among the judges! She was the one who took Christi aside to tell her how lovely Bruno was, who awarded Leo his Herding Group first place, and who REALLY wanted to give us another ribbon in the final round of show four (but Leo was just about pooped at that point). Of all the judges she gave me the impression that she just really honestly loved the dogs. She put endless energy into her judging and still made time to encourage the newbies like me. When she was writing her notes after our breed judging Leo decided to flirt and got his face right up next to hers and started giving kisses and I apologized--she put her arm around his neck, gave me a big smile and said "Oh, no, he's just fine!" She was the one who was sad there weren't more Shilohs at the show. Smile For future reference: Another movement judge. She made me re-run at least three times every time we came under her, with the "give him his head!" every time!

We hope you've enjoyed the story of Leo's 2009 IABCA Winter Sieger! What's next? The Tucson show--later this week!! Wish us luck!! :D

The Winter IABCA Hutto Show, Part Two!

2009-03-02T11:53:00.004-06:00

The next day was Sunday and we're up at 6 a.m. (as you can see from the above pic, the dogs were still asleep) because we have an 8 a.m. ring time. No time to worry! Christina Tanon and her dad were there with Bruno--what a handsome, handsome boy, with beautiful coloring and structure! This was show three, which you need to compete in to qualify for the Rare Breed Best of Show specialty competition, so Kyrie was entered in this one too! When the three of them went in for Best of Breed Leo got first, Bruno second, and Kyrie third. After we came out of the ring Blair and Charm showed up--ohh, Charm is soooo pretty! I sure hope Blair starts showing her! They got to watch us in the ring for show number four. Leo again came out first over Bruno, but the judge took Christina aside to tell her how wonderful Bruno was! He just needed a little more time to mature, he is going to be a stunning dog.

Here's Leo relaxing between shows:

So there we were with two more herding group competitions coming up, and Rare Breed Best in Show too. We went in for show three's Herding Group and pulled a third--a bronze medal for Leo!! YAY! This did loads for my confidence. Maybe I wasn't screwing up as badly as I thought! And Leo was running a lot better now. The practice was paying off! Then we went into the ring for show number four herding group. The judges made us run more than usual. Then one judge--the one who had complimented Christi on Bruno--asked me to run Leo again, and to give him his head completely. I was like Oh great, here comes the kangaroo! But Leo didn't bounce--he ran great!

WE WON FIRST IN HERDING GROUP FOR SHOW FOUR! We were headed for the Best in Show competition!!

After Leo took his Best in Group I went outside to walk him, and another Shiloh friend showed up! Dan Walker showed up outside the ring building on Sunday, accosted me with questions about Leo, and totally didn't tell me who he was! Well, finally he did, the big silly. Thanks Dan for your admiration of Leo and I hope some of those pictures you took turned out!!!!

So now we had to sit and wait...and wait...and wait...we were getting really tired, it had been a long weekend, and the dogs were crashed. Finally we came up for Rare Breed Best in Show. We got beat soundly by a wonderful Australian Cattle Dog and a beautiful Aussie. Oh well...we still have the overall BIS for show four...but wait--did they just call our number again??? What's going on?? A rather baffled me showed up at ringside...for the Best in Show for show three? OH--the two dogs who had beat Leo in show three's Herding Group had LEFT! We got to go in...I was all frazzled and totally not ready...and again they ran us more than usual. Finally the judge told me (constant refrain) "Run him around and give him his head this time". Oh boy...we did. Leo ran beautifully. WE GOT BEST IN SHOW!!!! "To the Shiloh with the REACH!" the judge announced with a big smile!! Oh boy oh boy Leo we did it!!!!!!!!!

After that I didn't care. In the BIS competition for show four we did our best and I think the Judges really wanted to give something to Leo but he was just too tired and wasn't extending--I heard them talking about it as we left the ring without another ribbon. I had noticed that he was running slower and the lead was loose. He was just so tired! And so was I...I begged Zak to get signatures for our win sheets and managed to muster enough energy to go get a show photo done with our huge ribbon.

And that was that...somehow we managed to drive home. Somehow I made it to work the next day. And boy were my legs killing me! But it was worth it. :) Here is a picture of "daddy" Zak, so proud of his Leo!!

The Winter IABCA Hutto Show, Part One!

2009-03-02T11:33:00.006-06:00

Wow, what a crazy and yet awesome weekend!

Friday night we drove down to the show. We stayed at the Wingate hotel--the nicest hotel I have ever been in that allowed dogs! It was wonderful! We were smart this time and brought two jugs of water from home so the dogs would not go "off" from new, strange water like they did at Homecoming. It made things much less stressful. Smile

Those of you who were at Homecoming know that Zak has always been the one to show Leo. First, Leo is definitely Zak's boy, and second, Zak has the longer legs!! I can only keep up with Leo in a full extended trot if I am flat out running, and I'll tell you, in the shape I'm in I can't keep that up for long! :P So we started out as usual with Zak taking Leo into the ring in show number one.

It didn't go well. Leo bounced all over the place and generally made it look like Tina's first outcross must have been kangaroo!! He was the only Shiloh (Kyrie was only entered in show three as we didn't have a lot of money for this one) and so he got Best of Breed, but he did not even get close to placing in Herding Group. We were demoralized and poor Zak, who loves his Leo, was so frustrated.

We did have something nice happen, though--Christine Rydzeski with Mazie and Barbera Betcher came to the show to visit! Barbara and her husband Stephen were the owners of Betterways kennel and the people who created and ran our awesome pedigree tracking programs, and Christine is their daughter! We were very happy to see them and even in the face of Bouncy Leo Syndrome the ladies were very encouraging. And Mazie is a beautiful dark sable, and such a sweetheart! Here is a picture of Barbara (left), Christine (right) and Mazie (bottom, in case you couldn't guess!).

I had worn my "show clothes" just in case we had decided to enter Kyrie in more shows at the last minute. I went out to trot Leo in the parking lot (hoping some exercise would take the edge off). When we came back in I trotted him up to Zak to show him that Leo was behaving better, but Christine told me that Leo and I looked really good together, and Zak asked me if I wanted to take Leo into the ring for show number two.

Now, I was nervous as all get out at the thought of taking Leo into the ring! Kyrie, she's a pushbutton dog--simplicity to handle, stacks in five seconds, easy as pie. Leo is a challenge! He is so big and so fast and he is one boisterous, silly dog who does not like to have his feet put places. But even more than that, I know that Leo is an amazing dog when he is at his best and I worried that I was not good or experienced enough to get his best out of him, and that I would keep him from doing well. I did finally agree to take him in, mostly because Zak was obviously so frustrated.

I got some tips from other handlers and headed into the ring. Leo wanted to pull but he did look a little better thanks to a friend with shepherds who advised me to start him out a little slower. It wasn't as terrible as I feared and the judge took me aside to ask me if Leo was the same dog she had seen in the other ring. She told me he ran better for me, which did WORLDS for my confidence. Maybe I could do this after all? Maybe I wouldn't trip over the dog and make him lose? Maybe! In Herding Group for show number two we still did not place, though. Here is a picture of a tired-out Leo in his x-pen at the end of day one!

I tried to not be nervous about the next day and decided to try to stay calm myself so maybe Leo would be. I also ran Leo around like a crazy woman, back and forth practicing trotting (and my handling)! Zak reminded me that Fred Lanting had told us not to worry about running in circles--just practice getting a solid trot back and forth, back and forth. We did a lot of that, because Leo would get bored and anxious waiting to go into the ring--so we trotted! And I could see the moment it "clicked" in Leo's head! Finally, maybe we would do okay the next day!

(and what DID happen the next day? Well here's a hint:

Wish Us Luck!

2009-01-28T21:38:00.004-06:00

I wanted to make a quick update to ask everyone to wish Leo luck--we are going down to Hutto, TX, for an IABCA dog show this weekend! Above is the professional photo taken at his last show, when he won the Rare Breed Best in Show puppy award. I finally got around to making it digital so we could put it up on here! ;)

Leo is on his way to becoming an ISSR Shiloh Shepherd stud! We had hip x-rays taken at just after one year and sent them in to the OFA for their preliminary rating. Leo came back "Good"! So we are very pleased and now we need to wait until he is two years old to get his adult rating for OFA and his rating from Penn Hip as well. We are considering which other health certifications we would like to do so we can get it all done at once. Leo passed his temperament test at Homecoming last year, so he is on track and looking good!

Check back after this weekend--I will try to have new pics up and a show report next week!

Leo and Littermates!

2008-10-28T14:50:00.008-05:00

One of the things I wanted to do for Leo's first birthday was collect pictures (past and present) of all of his littermates. Fortunately we are blessed with a fantastic circle of puppy parents, and almost all of us have kept in touch and traded pictures and information over the months! My profound thanks must go out to Anne, Liz, Karen, and most definitely Michelle for getting new pics of Kai, who we have not seen pictures of since she was quite small!

First let's look at the girls! Below we have Ginger and Kai at around three weeks, eight weeks, and one year! Sadly I couldn't find the original LER pic of Ginger so I settled for a different one.

Here we have Sunny and Nana, again at three weeks, seven or eight weeks, and one year (technically Nana is ten and a half months in the oldest pic, but it's the most recent I have). Sunny is the dark-faced girl on the left and Nana is on the right. Nana was the only smooth pup in our litter.

And, finally, here are Leo and MC! MC, of course, is the dark pup in the pic, and Leo the light one on the left. :)

I hope you enjoyed seeing the pictures of all of Leo's littermates as much as I have collecting them!!

Leo's First IABCA Show!

2008-10-07T12:31:00.007-05:00

This past weekend, October 4th and 5th, Zak, Leo, Kyrie and I attended our first IABCA dog show in Oklahoma City, the 2008 Sooner Sieger. But what is an IABCA show?

The International All-Breed Canine Association was founded in order to provide American and Canadian dogs with the chance to earn an International Championship title without having to travel overseas. IABCA partnered with an organization in Germany (UCI) to make this possible, and the shows are run in the format of a German Sieger show. What this means is that every dog that shows gets a personal critique and rating from the judge after they show--so you actually know *why* your dog placed the way he did!

Leo did incredibly well--you can see him in his flying trot, above--and obtained an SG-1 rating in every one of four shows (from four different judges). SG-1 is the highest rating possible for a puppy to get! Because Leo got four, he has earned both his National and International Puppy Championships with the IABCA in only four shows!

Because Shilohs are a giant breed and take a long time to mature, Leo will be in the Puppy class (9 months to 14 months) until December, and then in the Youth class (14 months to 18 months) until next year April. After that, he gets to compete against the big dogs at the IABCA shows! Kyrie, unfortunately, could not compete as her ear is in a brace and that is not legal at dog shows. I will put more about that when I catch up in her blog!

Here is a picture of Leo and Zak and Christi and Brandy just after they've come out of the ring! Christi and her whole family came up just for the second show on Saturday. She did very well her first time in the show ring, earning an SG-1 rating as well! Congratulations, Brandy!

Little Bruno came along too! Unfortunately he could not compete, as he turned three months the day AFTER the show! We just know he will be knocking judges' socks off in no time, though--what a lover boy! Below are pics of Bruno, one being ultra-cute and one with Leo--he crawled up to touch noses with Leo through his X-Pen!

We hope you are enjoying Leo's blog, and you can expect a lot more dog show pictures in the future! Leo's next IABCA show is in November in Houston. Wish us luck!!

Let's Play TUG!

2008-10-06T17:07:00.003-05:00

Lately I have been exercising my camera skills taking pictures of Leo and Kyrie playing. :) I know there will be days when I will want to look back at photos of them when they were younger and still growing up! So here are some pictures of our latest playtime session. :)

Leo: "Oh, Kyyyyyrie...look what IIIIIIII have...you want it, you know you do!"

Kyrie: "Yeah, right. I'm not falling for that again...really...awww, heck, I want that tug!"

Kyrie: "I know I can do it! I'm bigger now! Look out Leo, I'm gonna get that tug!"

Leo gives a tug and WHOOPS! Kyrie's paws have left the ground! What a moose that Leo is! Maybe next time, Kyr...

Hope you enjoyed them as much as the pups did producing them!!

Shilohs at the UKC Show!

2008-10-06T16:54:00.003-05:00

The North Texas American Pit Bull Terrier Club hosts a twice-annual UKC show here in Denton. We are always impressed with how nice and friendly the people are and it is great to introduce a couple of new people to the Shiloh Shepherd every time we show up! This time Zak was out of town and I could only take one dog, so Leo and I hopped in the car and zoomed out to the fairgrounds. I was glad I took Leo because all while we were there people were stopping over who remembered when Leo visited back in the spring! I have taught Leo to look at the camera when I say "Movie Star!" so here he is with his movie-star face:

We also had other Shiloh friends come for a visit! Christi and her family with Brandy, who was only ten weeks old at the last show, and their brand-new puppy Bruno came to the show as well! Brandy is such a sweetie, she is in training to be a Therapy Dog and she got lots of great practice meeting people! Bruno is an amazing pup, what a personality! Here is my favorite picture, with Leo looking back at the camera as if to say "Awww, aren't they cute?"

Usually when I'm the one taking pictures I never get any of my own dog, but Christi's dad was nice enough to take this one of me, Leo, Christi, and Brandy. Thanks for a great time, guys!

Fall Playtime!

2008-09-23T11:10:00.004-05:00

Leo and Kyrie got some serious playtime in on and around the first day of autumn! I decided that it would be nice to get some new pics, so here we go!

We love our pillow...wait, did Mom just say "Outside"??

Can I have that?

Time to play!!

We used to do this when you were a lot littler, remember Kyrie?

Oh, did you want this??

Shilohs in Motion!

We are a BLUR!

Oh now we are tired...where's that pillow?

I hope you enjoyed our pictures!

HOMECOMING!

2008-09-23T10:45:00.007-05:00

Isn't he gorgeous?? Here is Leo in a show stack. We managed to get him to stand in it for all of five seconds...LOL! Famous dog guy Fred Lanting (remember Fred from the dog show in Denton back in the spring?) was a judge at Homecoming in New York state and helped us stack him. But I'm getting ahead of myself...

In August, Zak and I decided that the craziest thing we could do would be to take our vacation time, load a ton of clothing, food, toys, dog utensils, and both dogs into the new car (my new Honda Element!) and take off for New York state!! Our breeder and breed founder, Tina Barber, holds an annual extravaganza appropriately called Homecoming. All of the Shilohs who can manage it try to return to New York for this awesome event! It's held at a campground in the beautiful hills of western New York state. Camping, food, Rally exhibitions, show handling lessons, a structure and gait seminar, dog evaluations by experts on the breed...it's all there! Not to mention there are so many FANTASTIC dogs and people to meet and get to know better!

Some of those people we got to know better are above--some of Leo's littermates returned for Homecoming!! There is MC on the left, being silly and not looking at the camera. He is Leo's only brother. :) His owner Anne is standing. Then there is Fred, who thought our litter was so awesome he wanted a picture of himself with them! Isn't that fantastic??? Next up are Michelle and Ginger, Leo's lookalike sister! Ginger and Leo got to play a lot over those four days! Their pavilion was set up next to ours. :) Then there is my handsome Zak and handsome Leo, hamming for the camera as usual. And finally there is Karen with her beautiful Nana, the only smooth coat pup from the litter! Nana is truly a gorgeous dog and won Puppy Best in Show on Saturday. Below is her stacked picture:

We have an amazing litter, I only wish we could have gotten stacked pictures of ALL Leo's siblings!

Finally, our big news...at the Specialty show on Sunday, LEO took Puppy Best in Show! In the Saturday show he took Winner's Dog Plush Puppy, and also Best of Opposites Plush. :)

Hope you enjoyed the pics!

--Anne :)

Leo at Nine Months!

2008-07-22T15:17:00.003-05:00

Yay! Leo turned nine months old on July 12th. Here he is in all his glory! You can really see the red hues in his coat in this picture. We were trying for a show stack but he moved that hind leg forward just as I snapped the pic! He is around 25.5-26 inches at the shoulder and 82 to 85 pounds depending on the scale. Though this is a little light for his age category we are not worried...we know how thin we're keeping him! We are hoping that by keeping him very slim we will manage to avoid stress on his growing skeleton and muscles, very important for giant breeds like the Shiloh. If we are lucky we can avoid a bout with pano...we are crossing our fingers!

Here is another current pic of Leo. I love this one even though it is a little out of focus. It reminds me of my favorite picture of one of New Zion's most famous sires, Grizz. Leo has that same handsome, smiling face, though darker than Grizz's! You can really see his cream-colored "bib" on his upper chest in this picture. We only have one picture of his dam, Holly, but it looked like she had the same kind of bib pattern.

Summer Playtime!

2008-07-22T15:10:00.003-05:00

It's summer and that means the dogs are feisty as all get out because they don't get to spend as much time outside...100 degrees = way too hot for long walks or extended periods out in the sun! When they DO get out it's explosive energy time...and time to play keep-away, as you see above! This pic was taken in mid-June. Once Leo gets the toy poor Kyrie doesn't really have a chance, though she sure does harry him! Unfortunately sometimes she gets a little too mouthy. We found a bite wound on Leo under his ear where she hit him harder than we knew! By the time we found it, it was scabbed over and healing already. We are very lucky it was not infected, and playtimes have been curtailed 'till it is fully-healed. The problem is that Leo is such the stoic dog, he's a very quiet one...even when Kyrie hurts him he doesn't let out a squeak. So we had no idea that had happened 'till we found the scab while grooming!

May Showers? Not in Texas!

2008-07-22T10:01:00.003-05:00

Here's Leo looking up at the sky wishing for rain. You can tell we haven't had a lot from the parched look of our yard!! Okay, okay, maybe he's watching a bird. Or a plane. Or the ball in my hand! ;)

Later on in May, we went to an awesome event here in our town called the Dog Days of Denton! They have shops, food, booths for the dog rescues here, and tons of activity demos for things like disc dogs, flyball, obedience, and my favorite--agility! We took both dogs, but it was very hot and we only stayed for a few hours. We hooked up with a group that teaches obedience classes here in Denton that we really liked. They don't teach during the summer--way too hot for outside classes--but both dogs will most likely start formal classes in the fall. Here is a picture of Leo and Kyrie at Dog Days!

April 25th - Leo's New Puppy!

2008-07-22T09:46:00.006-05:00

Meet Kyrie, Leo's new puppy! Kyrie came to us from New Zion, the same kennel Leo came from, but she was from a co-owned litter. Her daddy was Scout, a smooth white Shiloh, and her mom was Maya, a plush golden sable. Soon Kyrie will have her own Blog, and I will post that update here on Leo's! As you can see, she is absolutely beautiful. Leo was in love right away! He followed her around the yard and when she jumped on him to lick him he fell over! He did have time to pose for an awesome pic, though:

Doesn't he look like a wolf out hunting? I love that photo! :)

So Back in April...

2008-06-08T19:22:00.005-05:00

Nothing like a new puppy to distract a woman from blogging, but we'll get to that in a moment...

The weekend of April 18th we went to a local UKC (United Kennel Club) dog show right here in Denton, TX! It was sponsored by the local American Pit Bull Terrier Club and the show organizer, Patricia, was awesome enough to offer us the chance to do a small exhibition of our Shilohs even though we aren't a recognized breed yet! We jumped at the chance!

I think it was back around the New Year when Zak found out about the show. He also found out that Mr. Fred Lanting, "Mr. GSD" was actually going to be judging there!! We were very excited because Fred was a longtime friend of our breeder and the Shiloh shepherd Breed Founder, Tina Barber, and probably ranks as one of the most knowledgeable people on earth about dogs in general and German shepherds in particular! Even though Shilohs aren't GSD's, they are similar, and we were looking forward to getting Fred's opinion of our pup!

We got all we bargained for and more. We got an awesome introduction to the UKC, met a ton of fantastic people--breeders, exhibitors, and organizers--and Fred gave a structure and movement seminar and actually trotted our Leo around the ring!! Here is Fred elegantly moving our Leo:

And here is me, not-so-elegantly moving our Leo:

So it was tremendously exciting, we had a great time and learned a LOT!!

Leo of the Rings!

2008-04-01T15:53:00.002-05:00

This was too funny and we had to get some pictures. We got Leo a new toy, a stuffed ultra-durable chewing ring...but he was a little bit confused as to how to pick it up. When he finally did, the above was how he decided it was easiest to carry!

Click here for more gallery pics of Leo and his ring...in the first one you can REALLY see how dark his face is getting!!

Leo at Five Months!

2008-04-01T15:41:00.003-05:00

The puppy parents on the Holly/Acer '07 litter have mostly been keeping in touch, and we have been sending pictures around to each other to celebrate each month of our pups! Click here to go to the gallery of photos of Leo at five months old. The pic above is the one I call "My Best Smile"--we love it because he is the toothless wonder after losing most of his baby teeth! It is his silly "Wanna play?" smile. :) As you'll see in the gallery pics, our boy is darkening up a bit, especially in his face. Wait 'till you see the newest pics--coming soon!

Older Park Pics

2008-03-27T19:00:00.002-05:00

Had to put up a quick post with some older pics of Leo at our local park--especially since I liked one enough to use it as my avatar on the ISSR Shiloh Shepherd forums!. He's around four and a half months in these pics. They were taken on one of the nature trails at the park, which is huge and really nice--and only about three miles from our house! For the photos click here--enjoy!

Leo the Cone-head

2008-03-27T14:11:00.002-05:00

A few weeks ago we noticed our boy had an umbilical hernia. He hadn't had it before; it just popped out! The opinion seemed to be that since he had had several weeks of loose poops that the straining had done it. :( Poor pup! So we took him in for surgery to get it fixed two weeks back, and to keep him from bothering it he had to wear this Elizabethan collar for a week. It was so fashionable we decided to take a picture before we took it off last weekend!

Leo's Snow Day

2008-03-25T08:41:00.009-05:00

So at the end of February we got an unheard-of amount of snow here in Denton, TX--around six inches!! Leo was VERY excited as he hadn't been able to play in the snow since he was a nine-week-old pup at New Zion Shilohs in New York state. He barrelled around the yard, plowing through the snow like a wild thing!

I have never quite figured out how to stuff a bunch of pics onto this blog, but I know enough basic HTML to set up a separate page for you to view all of our Snow Day pics: HERE! Enjoy and more to come soon!

Leo Turns 16 Weeks!

2008-02-10T20:21:00.000-06:00

Welcome back to our blog everyone! Leo turned 16 weeks old on February 1st. We did a little photo shoot and you can see the result above. Isn't he a handsome devil? :) For more pics, go ahead and click this link to go to his 14 and 16 weeks photo album!

I have a scary and proud Leo story to share from last week, a scary thing that happened on his lunchtime walk. He's getting better, but still wrestles and wants to play when I am trying to get his leash on. It turns out that I apparently hooked the leash through the ID tag ring instead of the D ring when we were getting ready for his walk. That wire ring that holds his dog name tag on is not very strong at all! We were past the halfway point on the walk (he starts to pull a bit when it is obvious we are going home, and I have to correct more). Suddenly, the tag ring snapped and Leo shot ahead, off-lead!!

I said "Uh oh!" and stopped, had a quick panic attack, and Leo stopped and looked back at me. I said, "Leo, Come!" and gave our obedience hand signal for "come". And Leo came right back, right away!!! GOOD DOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh boy was I proud! I swear he can screw around being the wild dingo dog and ignoring me all he wants when we are out in the backyard from now on, as long as he always acts like he did today when we are out in strange places!! And only four months old!!

Today Zak and I were out in our backyard, which is about 75 feet wide. Zak stood on one side and I stood on the other, and we took turns calling Leo to "come!" back and forth. He did about eight 75-foot recalls, and off-lead! Shilohs really are awesome!!

More Leo Photos!

2008-01-06T19:49:00.001-06:00

So here is a shot of Leo at twelve weeks, taken on Saturday afternoon. His coat is definately turning more golden, changing from the puppy-fluff-grey tones it used to have. He still has a reddish hue to his ears and forehead, especially in the sun. The pale streaks framing his shoulder blades seem lighter to me now, though I could be imagining things!! His eyes are still light umber in color. I am hoping that his face stays lighter, but you can never tell!

I realized that I've been delinquent in my duties--I haven't linked to Zak's Picasa photo albums of Leo pictures! I'll remedy that immediately; if you would like to see all of our Leo pics, click this link!

Leo is Twelve Weeks Old!

2008-01-06T19:29:00.000-06:00

This picture is one our breeder, Tina, really liked...he's got some reach on him, does our Leonidas! His ears are not standing up yet but this photo caught him with both upright...an echo of what he'll be in the future! This was taken when he was eleven weeks old. We're trying hard to take photos regularly!

Friday the 4th of January Leo turned twelve weeks old. Wow, what a handful this boy is!! He is very spunky and smart, always trying to figure out how far he can go with Zak and I. Even though it's a challenge sometimes to keep our tempers, it's equally a challenge not to laugh at his antics! I don't think I've ever had a dog anything like this--I swear you can see the wheels turning in that gorgeous sable head of his! Tina spoke right when she told me not to let him use those pretty eyes to sway us into letting him get his way.

Probably the most frustrating thing for me so far is that until he has all his shots, I can't take him out on some nice walks to tire him out and use up some of that youthful energy! Luckily the third round of inoculations comes this week, and after that (though we are checking with our vet) I will feel safe to bring him out walking with me in our neighborhood. I know a lot of the "puppy crazies" are just him burning off energy. It's hard because though he is learning very fast he's still very young and has the attention span of a...well, of a twelve-week-old puppy!! LOL. Still, I love it because in the times when he is calm and attentive I can see a sign of the wonderful adult Shiloh he will grow up to be.

Leo's Origins and Family!

2007-12-30T15:31:00.000-06:00

The litter we originally wanted bred late, so we had to be flexible! We were instead placed on the Holly/Acer litter, born on October 12th, 2007. Follow these links and you can see Leo's ancestors and his brothers and sisters. Originally we wanted a BIG male (Shiloh adult males can top out at around 160 pounds!!), preferably a plush (longer-haired) sable. Unfortunately there were a lot of people waiting for males, and we realized as we talked that, much as we would like a particular look or sex, what was really important was our new pup's temperament. So we did what many an applicant has done in the past and put ourselves in Tina's capable hands!

The great irony was that after all of our being flexible and being willing to take a girl pup instead, the one which ended up being the best fit for us was exactly what we had originally wanted: a big, sable, plush pup, Blue Boy! We were ecstatic at the news, and the new pupster was dubbed Leonidas (because you just can't go wrong with Spartans, you know)! He arrived late, late at night on December 14th. The picture above is from that first night--we were all VERY tired!!

Where to get our Shiloh?

2007-12-30T15:17:00.000-06:00

Both Zak and I had been longtime fans of the German shepherd dog, but we had decided that the health and temperament problems we were always hearing about these days meant that the GSD was not an option for us. Now here was the Shiloh Shepherd, which sounded like a big GSD without those problems! Intrigued, we started digging up information on the Shiloh...or trying to. There was a lot of different information because the Shiloh is a breed still in development, so a lot of different people have their own ideas of what it should be. In the end, though, the largest registry and the most unified vision for the breed was the one endorsed by the breed founder, Tina Barber.

Tina's kennel, New Zion Shilohs in New York state, is where we finally decided to get our puppy. We first did a LOT of reading on the ISSR Shiloh Shepherd information site, which has amazing amounts of information on the history, development, and characteristics of the breed, as well as discussion boards full of friendly and helpful people! We read everything we could get our paws on and perused Tina's page on upcoming litters to see the ancestors of the future puppies and to find one that would fit our timing--we wanted our new pup to be ready to come home on the first day of Zak's five weeks of working from home over the holidays!

Why a Shiloh Shepherd?

2007-12-30T11:09:00.000-06:00

First, a brief introduction! We're Anne and Zak, Leo's owners. Neither one of us had owned a dog since our high school/college years, and both of us are in our thirties now--so it had been a while! After we bought our new house early in 2007, the talk turned to a possible puppy in our future. And here we are, with the little rogue up above now sharing our home!

So where did we find out about this breed, and why did we decide to go with an ISSR Shiloh Shepherd?

It turned out that Zak and I both had some pretty definite ideas on which breeds were our favorites! We knew that we would like a dog that was good with other pets, because I have two cats. We wanted a breed that was very good with kids, as Zak's and my siblings both had little ones. I wanted an intelligent, easy-to-train dog, because after years off I wanted to get back into Obedience and maybe Dog Agility events.

Zak and I took to looking through big dog books, talking together about what we did and didn't like about breeds and which ones fit our lifestyle best. Some of the books had bunches of breeds not recognized by the AKC yet. It was while looking through The New Encyclopedia of the Dog by Bruce Fogle that we came upon the entry for the Shiloh Shepherd!