12.12.2009:
Unfortunately we have gotten an early christmas "present" this year; a visit to a specialist which will include an operation for Calypso who has busted a ligament (*korsbånd*). It is somewhat unknown how this has happened - we haven't seen her do anything extraordinary. It started out as a light limping, and at first the vet thought it was an overstretched mucsle. As her situation didn't seem to improve we took her to the vet again today and got the bad news - she will need an operation. The good news is that there is a specialist who is using a new method that's supposed to be very good for large breeds. The recovery should be very fast and there is no chance of it busting again. I will write more about it once it's done and I know more about it. Hopefully this can be done before christmas.
Earlier this year we tried a new brand of food for the dogs - Marcus Mühle... It's dried food based on the BARF principles. Although the idea is good we have come to the conclusion that it doesn't work very well for our dogs. They really loved it, but seemed to drink endless amounts of water. I could fill up their two (big) water bowls before going to bed at night and in the morning they would be completeley empty! Sienna even had the occasional accident dring the night due to all the water she drank. Calypso seemed to gulp a lot too as the only one, but still I think they all consumed unnatural amounts of water on this diet. A while back we changed back to Science Hills Pro Plan (Natures choice) and that works really well for all our dogues. Now their water consumptions is back to normal. They are also fed lots of raw bones (4-5 times a week), tripe (kallun) and meat. I find that it is very compatible with Science Hills Naturs Choice so we are keeping it that way :-) We have used this brand before and we are happy with it.
Sienna is finally in heat! She's definetely a late bloomer being 14 months old, but being the baby of the house probably hasn't speeded things along. In her mind she's still a puppy :-) But how can she not be? All the other dogs lets her get away with anything, so the puppy-pass hasn't run out yet although I suspect that it will soon.
I updated the galley "My favorites". See it here.
From all of us to all of you we want to wish you a merry christmas and a happy new year! Hope 2010 will bring you all health, wealth and happiness :-)
25.11.2009:
Our friend Marianne has a gorgeous litter at the moment and there is still puppies available. If you are interested in a puppy see contact information below.
Skønne hvalpe sælges, 8 hanner & 4 tæver, født den 10/11 salgs klare den 05. Januar 2010. Ønskes flere informationer venligst kontakt;
Marianne tlf. +45 28102796
centiojonsson@mail.dk
www.kennel-centio.dk
13.11.2009:
I just couldn't resist updating with these new pictures. I just loved the pictures Ditte took of Amazonite Shea at the show, so I had to post them. I think it is shocking to see how much she looks like Clio! Only she is not as undershot as Clio which is good :-) See them here.
We often receive pictures from Sevillas owners and they are fantastic photographers! They have a gorgeous black masked male named Crack.... I think these pictures are totally hilarious!They totally make me smile :-) Have a great weekend everybody!
11.11.2009:
Time for another update...
We went to Herning International show last weekend with J'adore and had a really great time with a lot of nice people. J'adore came in 2nd in her class both days, so that's fine. Shea was also entered and came in 2nd in her class Saturday and won her class Sunday, but was not placed among the 4 best in best female. Sheas owners brought their 12 weeks old mastino pup, Alfredo, who totally stole the picture...soooo cute! Other than that I only got these pictures from the show, because my little camera can not handle that kind of lighting :-( That was the last show for us this year... Unfortunately we can't make it to Naestved later this month.
Otherwise nothing much to tell... We are waiting for J'adore to go into heat which should be next month sometime. I got some wonderful halloween pictures of Sevilla so I just have to share them; ... and yes, I do miss her!
24.10.2009:
Nothing much has happened here lately - this update is just to share some pictures I got from our puppy-buyers :-) See the new pictures of Sevilla, Szeska, Sugar Babe and Seraphina here.
Seraphina or Karla as she is called lives very close by so we dropped by with Sienna for a play-date last week. She's doing really well in her new home and she is one of these dogues who has no clue how big she is! And she is quite big! As you can see she will crawl all over you if she can to get an extra cuddle.
I have entered J'adore both days for Herning International show and we are looking forward to that :-)
14.10.2009:
Happy Birthday beautiful Sienna and the rest of the S-litter! I can't believe it's already been a year, but what a great day it was when the 12 puppies entered this world. Here's some pictures of our sweet heart 1 year old. Some how Sienna has ended up being a very spoiled dogue...She was so sweet and gentle as a puppy that we just couldn't help showering her with love and attention with the result that Sienna more or less thinks she owns the planet! She has a magic way of getting away with lots of things because she's so adorable.
The final paperwork on J'adore has now been done and her health tests has been completed. This means that J'adore is now qualified for breeding. Her status are: HD: C, ED: 1 and SAS: 2,39. Her Aorta is 2,23 cm. which is good. I'm a bit surprised that her ED score came out as 1 as the vet said there was nothing to see. For that reason we might re-score her in 6 months, but I haven't decided yet if we will do it. Whatever the number is it is the same dogue and J'adore is fit and healthy which to me is the most important thing.
We will breed her in her next heat and have found a great male. See more about that here.
I also updated Clios gallery, Siennas gallery and added a few new pictures in the 2009 gallery here.
05.10.2009:
I just had to update with these pictures I got from Sevillas new owner! I had to just laugh out loud :-) I think it is quite obvious that she feels right at home with the new gang.
I also updated with some new pictures of Zeus (Sisco), Santos, Sziva (Sierra) and Shea. See them here.
02.10.2009:
Sevilla has left the building... We met up with her new owners in Liége (Belgium) Saturday and turned her over to them. Saying goodbye to her was really hard after having known her for the 6 weeks that she stayed here. We miss her, but we feel quite sure that she will have a great home with her new owners and we have already gotten a lot of new pictures. Her transition to her new home has gone really well, and she has also had her debut in the showring. Sunday she was entered in the junior class at the Belgium Clubmatch and received an Excellent. She was not placed among the top 3, but we are proud of her :-). We look forward to following her and you can see more about her life here at the kennels web.site: www.lexigence.be
As you might remember in our last update we had to pull J'adore out of a show because she suddenly walked "funny"... She didn't exactly limp, but seemed to want to step on the outside of her back foot - I suppose it was an attempt to lighten the burden on that leg (if you can say it like that...). It didn't dissapear over the next couple of days as I thought it would, so of course we took her to the vet. A thourough examination (X-rays, tests etc.) was done only to come to the conclusion that nothing seemed to be wrong. Our vet could not really suggest anything except try swimming and perhaps a change of food. We have already been swimming with J'adore and we feel that J'adore is already fed the best possible way with the relevant supplements (glucosamin, kondroitin, msm and fish oil). So basically something was obviously wrong, because J'adore has never had any problems before, but it seemed like nothing could be done... I have always been interested in alternative treatments for humans, because as great as the natural science is there just seems to be some problems they can't cure their way. I consulted a certified dog massage business (www.hundemassor.dk) and got in touch with a girl named Jane, who comes around to peoples houses to perform dog massages. She found that J'adore had some strong tensions in her back and lower back and in her leg - she thought a muscle was pinched. What has caused it is a bit of a mystery, because we haven't seen her do anything particular, but it could have been a simple misstep or a twitch...we will never know. But anyways J'adore got a 2 hour massage and loved every minute of it. She was noticebly better afterwards and a week later when Jane came back a lot of the tensions had gone. We will continue this treatment for a few more weeks. I just thought I would share this story, because I think a lot of people are not aware of this treatment option, and I was really amazed by the effect it had on J'adore. If you want to see Janes web.site then go to www.janeshundemassage.dk
I think that was it for now :-)
20.09.2009:
The updates are not as regular as they usually are... I've been really busy at work and then came down with the flu :-(
Sevillas time with us is coming to an end and very soon she's moving to her new home. We will miss her, but her new owner will get a wonderful dogue. If we didn't have Sienna we would have kept her for sure. But we feel that 4 is a good group, so we are sticking to that.
Seraphina aka Karla has enjoys life in her new home, just look here:
Sometimes you are just flat out un-lucky.... I had entered both Clio and J'adore for 2 days at Brøndby International show. And booked and paid for a hotel, but Clio went into heat earlier than we thought she would and teh thought of bringing a hormonal hyper-attentive-to- all- male-species didn't seem that appealing. I was still conidering it up until the day befor where I took her for a walk. At some point she saw a wild rabbit and ran after it for the longest time ever. When she returned to me she limped on a back-leg. So bringing her was out of the question. I went with J'adore who was fine in the morning when we left, but seemed to walk "funny"/limp a little on the move when we were supposed to enter the ring. So we didn't. We went home in stead of staying and of course this morning there were no problems with her. How typical is that! But anyways we did have a great day and as always there were a lot of nice people :-)
I'm very happy about the way J'adore has developed. On top of that she is just such a sweet heart! I added a few new pictures in her gallery. See them here. Let's just say that life is never dull with J'adore! She has gotten her second puppy-time with Sienna and Sevilla and the 3 of them can really turn the house up-side-down! I had a sofa-cleaning project last week where a pillow unfortunately "died"!
06.09.2009:
Today we went to Silkeborg show (a clubshow) for the first time... A very beautiful place and luckily the weather was good :-) We showed 3 dogues and it went well for all of them. Both Clio and J'adore got excellent, but J'adore beat Clio in best female and ended up as BOS. Sienna got a blue band which of course isn't something to brag about, but I think she did really well in the ring and since it is her first show I'm really happy with her debut. I haven't had to ringtraining yet just tried to practice a little at home, but she was really easy in the ring :-)
With that said I thought the judge came up with some strange comments... He measured Clio and claimed that she was 3 cm smaller than she actually is and then declared that she was a small female... We had a good laugh about that, because looking at our Italian mama "small" is not the first word that come to mind!
All in all we had a great day with some nice people :-) Congratulations to all the winners and thanks to Louise for taking pictures :-)
04.09.2009:
It has been a while since last update.... We have had some busy weekends and it has taken some time to get back into the game workwise after 5 weeks vacation :-)
Sevilla quickly became an integrated member of our gang and she, Sienna and J'adore is a hot trio! They are just so much fun to watch and they really seem to enjoy each others company. If we didn't have Sienna we would without a doubt have kept Sevilla. She's just such an adorable girl and in certain ways I actually think she's better than Sienna. She has a great body and movement and a great chest for her age. She's smaller than I thought at first - I measured her and she is only 57 cm tall (which is the minimun according to the standard) and she weighs 43 kilos. Of course she's only 10½ months old and will still grow obviously, but she's definetely what you can call "low-to-the-ground"! She seems to look more like Nikitas lines where Sienna looks more like Clio. It has been a bit tough deciding what to do with her and we are not completely done yet...
Otherwise nothing new to tell... Sienna will be entering her first show on Sunday, so we hope it will be fun :-)
I updated the gallery. See it here.
07.08.2009:
My summer vacation is coming to an end soon and Monday I will be back at work. Like always - when you are in good company - time flies!
One of the best things about owning a Dogue de Bordeaux (or 4!) is how they make you laugh every day. These pictures just put a smile on my face every time I see them, so I made them a gallery. See it here.
Due to personal reasons Sevillas owner were unable to keep her so we bought her back yesterday and she's now living with us. I hadn't seen any recent photos of her so I have to say that we were more than pleasantly surprised when we saw her again! In my opinion she looks fantastic! She also has a wonderful personality, is well-trained- and socialized and moves like a dream. She will be moving at some point, but we will try to find someone interested in showing. We are not in a rush though and are happy to have her back with us. She's been very well-received by the other dogues and has settled well into the group. She's 57 cm tall and weighs 43 kilos at almost 10 months of age. Here's a few pics of Sevilla;
30.07.2009:
Life's been a bit up and down lately...This time there are both good and bad news. Let's start with the good...
Seraphina has settled into her new home really well and her new familiy adores her :-) She lives in perfect harmony with the familys two cats. It is obvious that Sienna enjoys being the solo-baby in the house again.
We had a visit from Charlotte and her adorable new puppy Leiah. Meeting 4 big dogues Leiah was a bit shy at frist, but Clio is a true mother at heart and loves babies so she threw herself on the floor and played with her and after a while Leiah lost all shyness and happily "attacked" Clio :-) The two of them had a lot of fun...
And now to the bad news... As you may remember Sullivan was accidently hit by a car when he was 5½ months old. We had thought that he had been well-checked by the vet at the time of the accident and that time would heal his injuries. We thought he was recovering, but apparently not. To both. Sullivan kept limping and since the accident was 4 months ago clearly something must be wrong. X-rays were made and when I saw them I just started crying. His hip was crushed and had been deformed because he's been walking around with the injurie untreated. It looked terrible... There was a big visible injurie to the hip and some of the hipbone were gone. God only knows if it had been possible to fix this if it had been X-rayed at the time of the accident, but it just breaks my heart to know that he's been walking around on a crushed hip for 4 months. He was a beautiful boy inside out and I am very sad that his life ended so young.
Rest in Peace sweet boy.
22.07.2009:
Seraphina has found a new home and moved today. We will miss her as she was truely wonderful, but we feel quite sure that she will have a great home with her new family. She lives just 15 minutes from our house so hopefully we will see her from time to time. She now lives with an older rottweiler and a cat and their first meeting went really well.
20.07.2009:
New pics of our darling Calypso who's gallery doesn't get updated that often, because she hates to be photographed :-) See them here.
And a few new pictures of Miss J'adore who on the other hand almost can't get close enough to the camera ;-) See them here.
Otherwise absolutely nothing new to tell... Life is nice and quiet here and we are very much on vacation mode :-)
16.07.2009:
Just got these new pictures of Amazonite Sisco aka Zeus who is 9 months old - and I thought they were too good not to share. So here they are :-) Lovely boy, isn't he? See more about him at his own page http://www.lolaogzeus.dk/
04.07.2009:
My summervacation just started today :-)
This year we are pretty much just staying home and plan on spending our time fixing up a couple of things on the house and of course relaxing with our dogues... With the weather we have been having so far I can't complain...
Seraphina has been with us for 7 weeks now. Due to a very poor diet and severe exhaustion (over excercise) she was literally skin and bones - her musclemass especially in the front had decreased dramatically and made her limp. Luckily a good diet and some rest did wonders for her and today she's doing really well. So well in fact that we have decided to start looking for a new home for her. I took her for a through vet check yesterday (including X-rays) and she's doing fine. However it does take time to rebuild musclemass so we will intensify her swim training to 3 times a week. There is still some way to go, but over time she will be fine. We hope to find a new great home for her over the summer. We have been debating whether we should keep her here for another couple of months until she's fully rebuild, but we feel that it is better for her to go to her own home rather than getting even more attached to us and then having to leave.
Like I said before she is a true joy to have around and she will make you laugh every day with the little crazy things she does... We have caught her crawling into our bath tub a few times, because it's where we sometimes defrost bones... The other dogues will just wait around the bath tub, but Seraphina just went for it;
I updated the BARF-page.... See it here.
Otherwise nothing left to say than have a great summer! I'm sure we will see some of you at the Fall-shows :-)
21.06.2009:
Once again I have taken too many pictures.... I added a few in Siennas gallery here and the 2009 gallery here.
Seraphina is still recovering, but she's doing better and better. Hopefully in a month or so we can start looking for a new home for her. We will keep doing what we are doing with her now and then have a full health check on her before trying to place her. She has an energy level from a different world or maybe she has some german shepherd blood in her veins? She has settled in well with the other dogues and would play non-stop with them if we let her. One of these days I will make her a page of her own.
14.06.2009:
Another lovely sunny day has passed and I got some pictures of the gang in the garden. See then in the gallery here. I haven't been able to get any good shots of Sienna lately, but I did add one of her in her gallery because it is so typical of her. She's such a snuggly girl - she'd kiss and cuddle all day if she could.
This weekend there was an international show in Vejen for 2 days. We didn't enter any dogues as we thought it was too close to the arrival of Clios "puppies", so we didn't go, but Amazonite Shea went both days and did well. She got a 1st price (SL) Saturday and won her class Sunday. Of course we are very happy about that and I'm sure so is Shea's owners :-) They promised to send me some pictures, so I will post them once I get them.
I added some new pictures of Sisco, Szeska, Santana, Seraphina and Shea. See them here.
10.06.2009:
Sadly this is the only content of the puppy-box this time around;
.....Obvisously it is not what we had hoped for, but hey...that's life! It turned out to be a false pregnancy,so unfortunately there won't be any Clio-Simon puppies this time :-(
Clio is in a great mood though and enjoys playing with her daughter Seraphina... She really did look pregnant and acted pregnant too. However we got suspicious and a scan at the vets today confirmed the fact that she is empty. So a certain madam in this house is going on a diet!! Her name starts with C and ends with O!
03.06.2009:
Just wanted to share these pictures of Seraphina! And yes, it is very hard not to like this girl :-) We have taken her swimming 3 times now and it's a big succes. In the beginning she was a bit weary, but the last time she jumped in herself! It has payed off already and although there is still a long way to go, her musclemass is improving! Obviously she's in her worst Pluto-phase, but I do think she will be nice one day :-) As you can see she's very undershoot at this point, but that's a familiy trait and hopefully the rest of her face adjust to it as she grows :-)
Sienna weighs just under 40 kilos now, but doesn't realize how big she is. She just LOVES to snuggle and will crawl all over you if she ecan get away with it :-) And by the way she would also like a bite of the cookie you might be eating.
26.05.2009:
We went to visit Vega yesterday for the first time since we had to place her. Needless to say it was great to see her again and she seemed happy to see us :-) She has an excellent home with Lene, so we are just glad to see that things are going so well with them. Vega was just like we rememberd her - just see the pictures below;
Seraphina is doing better and better! A lot of rest and some moderate excercise has done her well and she almost doesn't limp anymore. She enjoys the BARF diet and although it will take some time to build her muscles it looks better already. She's going swimming for the second time tomorrow. And like I already said she is just sooo cute :-) Here's a few pictures of her;
We are all enjoying being able to spend more time outside. Took some photos of a little picnic we had in the garden. See them here.
21.05.2009:
A LOT has happened since our last update... Seraphina is back with us! We will not bring the full version here, but to cut a long story short Seraphinas owners and we agreed it would be best to sell Seraphina back to us. Although they loved her dearly, they quite simply had a lifestyle that was too hectic for a growing Dogue de Bordeaux. They enjoyed long walks and lots of activities and since a young Dogue de Bordeaux must only get moderate excercise while growing this quite simply didn't work. Seraphina is a VERY active Bordeaux and is very social and they didn't feel they could manage to give her only moderate excercise. Of course we wish they had followed our advice in terms of feeding and excercise, but with that said we are very glad that they agreed to sell her back to us. We took her for a check at our vet and he confimed what we believed too; she just needs a good diet, some rest and moderate excercise and to rebuild lost musclemass and then she will be just fine :-) So we have started taking her swimming and will do so every week and switched her to a BARF diet (raw). She has been here for 6 days now and although she limped when she came, it is much better now. It has been easy to fit her into the gang and she was comfortable with the other dogues right away. She is just the sweetest little girl ever! And not afraid of anything :-) We love her spirit so having her back isn't too bad :-) Our plan is to keep her here for a few months to recover and then find her a new home. She will have a page here soon where you can follow her. But for now here's some pictures of the sweet heart; (and speaking of the goofy-looking gene - see last update - I think the first one is kinda funny )
Clio surprised us by going into heat 2 months earlier than planned! It takes 20 hours to get to Simons home in the very south of France - and well... 20 hours back! That is a LONG drive to take and yet another situation where you realize that you are not 20 years old anymore :-) ( READ: Karen felt hammered for days after we returned!) I saw Simon for the first time 3 years ago when we visited the kennel. At almost 8 the age is starting to show a little, but with that said he still looks fabulous! He has one of the most wonderful balanced tempers we have seen. He kept his cool - even with a female in heat around. Clio on the other hand nearly busted with excitement when she saw him. We thought we would breed them at least twice, but Simons owner Elisabeth told us, that Simon could smell/sense when the time was right, and if he felt that the timing wasn't right or if he felt that he already had done the job he would refuse to mate. So we waited to the following day and just like she said Simon was more interested and within minutes it happened. We stayed in France to the day after to see if they were up for another breeding, but just like Elisabeth said - Simon felt he had done what he needed to do and after sniffing Clio he went back to his favorite spot in the sun :-) See our pictures from the trip here.
Thanks to Elisabeth & Yves Coiffard for letting us use this wonderful male and for a great time in France!
13.05.2009:
Just a little update with a few new pictures of the gang.... We are enjoying the beautiful weather and the dogues spend a great deal of time outside these days and totally love it. Gallery.
We got some new pictures Szeska and Basil (Spencer). See them in their gallery. Sadly Sullivan was hit by a car a month ago and has been limping on one back leg where he was hit for a while. Time will tell if he will recover from this, but so far he's doing okay.
Our little J'adore is suddenly getting older... It's hard to believe that she's actually 17 months old now and can get her official HD/ED results in a month! How time flies... It will be exciting to see if she passes her health tests and qualifies for breeding, but once again; time will tell!
One of the reasons why we just couldn't part with Sienna and sell her like planned was that she is sooo much like Clio! Not just in terms of looks but also in terms of personality. It is so much fun with a little "copy" :-) Just see the pictures below: (Clio is 8½ months old - Sienna is 7 months old). I didn't know that looking goofy could be heridity, but I guess it can :-)
03.05.2009:
I got bored with the colors of the web.site and changed it - as you can see... I cleaned up Sienna's gallery and added a few new pictures of her.
There was a show only 12 km from our house today, but forgetful as I was, I forgot to enter our dogues in time. How bitter is that? Anyways...I went to watch and it was a nice a day in good company. Amazonite Shea was entered in the puppy class and did well. However she did not want the judge touching her so she jumped a little, but the critique was good. I think she looks really good - she's very harmonic for her age. It is quite obvious that it is Clio's daughter too as you can probably tell from the picture on the front page.
Since I wasn't showing myself I had the chance to take some pictures. The lighting wasn't the best and my little camera prefers sunshine - so the quality vary a bit. See them here.
26.04.2009:
I have added pictures of the dogues in the planned litters pedigree... If you want to see their ancestors just click on their names.... A few new pictures in the 2009-gallery- See them here.
And a few new pictures in Siennas gallery. See them here.
And although the information is pretty much the same I upated the "about us" section with some new questions. See it here.
19.04.2009:
Spring is really here for good and we have had the most amazing sunny days! Today was no different when we went to Hedensted show... We were outside and it was actually almost too hot! The entry wasn't very high though, but we had a great time today in good company and both Clio and J'adore did well. Sienna was entered in the puppy class, but she had to stay home because she has injured a knee 2 days ago and limped a little. Her litterbrother Zeus (Sisco) was there and did fine. We hadn't seen him since he left when he was 8 weeks old and needless to say he had grown a lot! But he looked very handsome and Diana did a great job with him in the ring :-)
I have started ringtraing with J'adore and although we have only had 2 sessions she seems easier already. Obviously we still have a long way to go, but she seems to know what it's about now. Clio got her first CAC today and became BIM which we of course are happy about :-) We managed to get some pictures from the show, but as you can see I was a bit too far away from the judge stand to gt good pictures of everybody. See them here.
Also I added a couple of pictures in the 2009 gallery. See them here.
04.04.2009:
It's time for a litte update... We are all enjoying the warmer and sunnier weather! Spring seems to be here for good now :-) Or at least we hope so. J'adore is fully recovered loves to be able to outside again. Sienna has reached the age where she looks a bit funny. She had an eye-infection and we went to the vet where I got a shock when we got her on the scale; she weiged 33 kilos at the age of 5½ months. And... she has a tendency to get a bit chubby so we have cut down her food a little bit. Obviously she needs to get the right kind of nourishment, but we try to keep her slim so she won't get joint problems. She has a huge appetite and will clean up if she's given the chance. It's funny how their appetites can differ! Our first dogue Vega was a very picky eater and could easily go a couple of days without eating if she didn't get her favorite food.
There are new pictures of Santos, Sullivan and Zeus (Sisco) on the puppy-page. See them here.
J'adores gallery has also been updated. See it here.
After a bit of a struggle with the Danish kennel club we finally got the thumbs up to use a french male for Clios next litter. The problem is - when you use a french male - that their hip and elbow results are jugded by SADB (the French Dogue de Bordeaux club) not the French kennel club. So we needed to get different types of validations/approval from both SADB and the French kennel club. And another problem is that they use a slightly different elbow-scale in France, where they have to classifications of "free" which is 0 and SL (the rest of the scale is 1,2,3 which is the same as we use in Denmark). And this male had a status SL which isn't on the Danish scale. I will spare you the details of all this and just say that at the end of the day we are happy to get the approval from the Danish kennel club!
I fell in love with this male, Simon Kwan de la Seigneurie des Chartron, when we first started looking for our second Dogue de Bordeaux and visited the kennel where he lives. Our plan was to get a puppy after him, but for different reasons that never happened. That's a few years ago now, and because Simon is almost 8 years old I actually thought he had retired from breeding. I e-mailed his owner in regards to another dogue (his 15 months old son Camille) and she told me that Simon is still going strong! So it didn't take us long to decide on using Simon for Clios next litter. See more under planned litters here. It will be a loooong trip to take (20 hours each way), but we hope it will be worth it :-)
26.03.2009:
The 3 weeks of rest has worked for J'adore and she's all fit for fight again. She has hated every minute of it and I suppose as a comfort she has decided that since she can't join us for the daily walks she has the right to spend the night in on of the couches!
Sienna has earned herself a few less flattering nicknames lately; terminator, little Id (as in the freudian psychology where the Id is the primitive impulse-driven part of human nature). The last one is because she's unlike our other dogues in so many ways! She seems sooo driven by what she feels... When we bring out the food she will act like someone who has starved for weeks. When she's paid no attention to - and wants it - she will bark loudly. She has chewed the corners of our coffeetable - and worse - the window frame of a new terrace door! This has made her a little unpopular and when we just found out we were ready to sell her to the highest bidder! Luckily for her she's so cute that you somehow find it in you to forgive her. The problem is that Sienna is a morning dogue, so she wakes up before the other dogues and find the time to do her little activities!
15.03.2009:
It's been a the most wonderful sunny day! After the long, dark Scandinavian Winther the first days of Spring are always very welcome and we spent a great deal of time outside today. The grass looks horrible and muddy, but I managed to get some picture of the dogues. See them here.
J'adore is doing fine again, but we will give her another week of rest before she'll come along for the walks again.
Last week Shea's new owners stopped by for a visit and brought Shea! She seemed to recognize Clio and us again instantly and seemed happy to be back. It was great to see her again. Unfortunately the lighting outside was very bad and She didn't want to stand still, so the pictures from that day couldn't really be used. But Shea is doing well - she's more or less the same size as Sienna just a little lighter and faster :-)
07.03.2009:
A houserenovating/building project on our house that has stretched over 2 years has F I N A L L Y come to an end! Words cannot describe what a relief it is to finally have some freetime on weekends so I have had some time to do some small changes on the web.site.
J'adore injured a knee on a walk a week ago and has been ordered 3 weeks of rest by the vet. She is without a doubt our most active dogue so that news did not go down well with her! it's going better now and it's a little easier to keep her quiet, but the first few days she was literally climbing the walls. And tables...I caught her on my desk looking out (the other dogues were outside) - she just jumped - so from then on we have kept the door to the office closed! As you can see our little Sienna is not so little anymore. She's doing fine and so far hasn't had any growing related problems.
25.02.2009:
Nothing new to tell... I just loved these new pictures of Sullivan so I had to share them... I can't believe how big he has gotten - although I shouldn't be surprised as he was always the biggest puppy of the litter.
19.02.2009:
Yesterday we took Clio for a heart scan in order for her to have an official result. We attempted this about 7 months ago with a disastrous result. In short: The vet was a bit rushed and clearly wanted the whole thing done and over with as quickly as possible. Clio absolutely freaked out and thought we were going to kill her. Obviously with a dogue fighting as hard as she can to get up and away it became more or less impossible to get an exact result. In the end it was quite painful to watch 4 adults trying to hold her down and Clio who panicked, so we didnt finish the scan and we decided to go elsewhere and give it another try another time when Clio (hopefully) had forgotten the incident. We decided to take her to Bygholm dyrehospital which is the same vet who did the heart scan of the S-litter. We found him to be very pleasant and calm and this worked out really well with Clio. We had no problems at all and Clio seemed to relax during the scan, so I was very relieved! She got the result AoVmax 2,35 and her Ao was 2,3 cm - a result we are happy with.
It is a common problem that heart scans can come out with different results all depending on who performs them! We have had all our dogues heart scanned performed by different vets and - in case anyone can benefit from our experience - I will definetely recommend using this vet Gustaf Valentiner-Brandt in Horsens (Bygholm dyrehospital). Having had 13 dogues heart scanned there I can honestly say that's is always a plesant experience to deal with him; he always takes time to explain things, never rushes but tries really hard to get exact results and is really great with dogs - also the ones who tend to stress and do not want lay on the scanning table.
I think I have found the right male for Clios next litter. We are currently looking into it, so I will post info once we got it confirmed. Clio has already been in heat since the puppies were born, so I would expect her to go into heat again sometime this summer.
14.02.2009:
J'adore is no longer a show-virgin! We went to Fredericia International show today entering J'adore in the junior class and Clio in open female. I havn't had time to ringtrain J'adore at all, but I think she took it very well, was easy to show and won her class. Clio also got a 1st prize but came in second in her class. I'm very happy with their critiques though and well, I need to ringtrain both (and myself ;-)) a lot more. I've added their critiques under "show" in their profiles. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures at all - it was a bit chaotic as we didn't bring a cage and there was a lot of dogs... However I got a pictures of J'adore when we got home that pretty much summs it up; she was one very tired little dogue! But all in all it was nice to be at a show again and we look forward to show more and see you all again next time!
Otherwise nothing new to tell really... Life is nice and quiet and we are very happy that we decided to keep Sienna! She quite simply is the happiest most charming little girl you can imagine! As she is our own breeding it's especially funny to see her grow up and notice how many traits she has inherited from her mother. Just like Clio Sienna can be a bit reserved with strangers until she gets to know them. And just like Clio she has an ENORMOUS appetite and is always the first in line whenever she hears the "sound of food". She loves to cuddle and will follow you around. So really....she's just a joy to be around. I've added a couple of new pictures in her gallery.
01.02.2009:
Just had to update with some new pictures of Sienna.... I've said this before and I will say it again; it's just too hard NOT to take a lot of pictures when you got a cute puppy in the house! She weighs 20 kilos now, but seems to be growing in a harmonic way.
Got the funniest pictures ever of Clio and Sienna playing outside. See them here.
Otherwise nothing new to tell... We are looking forward to the international show in Fredericia where we have entered Clio in the open class and J'adore in the junior class. I haven't had the chance to ring train with J'adore at all, but I have signed up for a class beginning in March.
26.01.2009:
Sierra aka Liva has now found a nice new home and moved tonight. We wish the new owners all the best of luck with her and look forward to following her.
So once again it's quiet here. Liva was A LOT more active than Sienna and could really get the party started. We even had to seperate them from time to time so they didn't strain each other too much. But with that said it's just impossible not to like Liva - she's just such a happy easy going girl. Yup...you guessed it... I'm always a little sad when a puppy leaves the house. The different owners have started sending pictures and I've started posting them in the puppy-gallery. Just keep them coming - we just love seeing how the little ones develop :-)
A few new pictures in Siennas gallery. See them here.
A new gallery. See it here.
And a few new pictures of Sullivan, Santana, Santos and Szeska in the S-litter gallery. See them here.
02.01.2009:
It has definetely gotten quiet here after all the puppies have left... We has a few staying over Christmas, but now they are all in their new homes except for Sienna who'll be staying with us. The only thing I don't miss is cleaning up like a hundred little pee-pees on the floor. I do find that Dogue de Bordeaux puppies are very easy to house-break and given the chance Sienna will do her business outside.
While our focus has been so much on the puppies and Clio for the past months it seemed like our baby-girl J'adore has just grown up in the meantime! It seems like she has developd a lot and is suddenly becoming a little lady... She turned a year earlier this month and I'm guessing that she weighs around 55 kilos now. Never the less she's still very much the clown in the house. We will start showing her this year so it will be exciting to see if the judges like her as much as we do... Or if we have gone kennel blind...hehehe...
Unfortunately Clio has strained a fiber in a shoulder and has been limping so she's staying home from our daily walks. She's doing better though so hopefully she'll be fin again soon.
I made a gallery of the S-litter where I plan to post new pictures of them as they come in. See it here.
A few new pictures in J'adores gallery.
A few new in Siennas gallery.
