Rottweilers

I have had one or more dogs almost all of my life, except for the few years I was a city dweller. A friend introduced me to dog shows in the early 70s and I started looking for "my" breed a year or two later. All puppies are adorable, but I was lost the minute I picked up my first Rottweiler puppy.
My first puppy came from Arizona, the second came from the Merrymoore Kennels in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1976, and my Rottweiler experience began, a love affair that lasted for more than 20 years. My last homebred litter was whelped in 1991, shortly after my mother died and my father came to live with me. I moved from Montana to Kentucky in 1998 with the horses and my last two Rotts. The following year, my last homebred dog died of cancer and the year after that I lost Heidi.

My first show dog undoubtedly gave me an unrealistic view of the show dog world in some respects. Merrymoore's Ric-O-Shay got his AKC championship as well as his AKC obediance title and went on to be shown as a champion and was in the top-10 standings nationally for two years, with very limited showing. Not only was he a superlative showdog, but was an incredible ambassador for what was then a comparatively rare breed.
My breeding program was primarily based on Rottweilers from the Merrymoore Kennel in Georgia and my plan was to have several linebred bitches to establish a foundation, then bring in a dog from completely different lines. The outcross was a German import, making the bloodlines as much different as possible, with a more compact body, which I wanted and an extreme head. and "Hummel" became my personal companion.

He was a trained working security dog when I purchased him at just under two years old, intended originally as my husband's working dog, but he decided I was "his person" and he because my personal companion. He produced a number of outstanding show dogs as well as many working police dogs and several search and rescue dogs.
Hummel himself was never shown, thanks to an early introduction to horses, which left him with several missing teeth, but his offspring certainly made their mark in the show and working world, particularly with his daughters. One daughter finished her championship at Westminster by taking Winner's Bitch from the open class and went on to go Best Opposite the following year as a competing champion. Another daughter won or placed at both Regional and National specialties as well as being top-ten rated in the AKC national standings both as a class bitch and as a special.

His portrait and more details about him are on my art studio website: http://oldgreymareart.blogspot.com/2008/12/whos-been-sleeping-in-my-bed.html





Pennybrooke at Westminster











Elsa at the Region VI Specialty











I no longer have a Rottweiler in my home, but somehow, after so many years, it seems wrong that there is not a big black dog by my side as there was for so many years of my life.