Norwegian Buhund

Breed Notes 4th April 2020 Margaret Deuchar

NORWEGIAN BUHUNDS

How are you all? What a couple of weeks it has been, we are in lock down and we have no idea how long it will go on for, but if it helps to save lives that is all that matters. I used to think how quickly the days were going by, but not anymore. I know some of you are able to work from home, which obviously helps to keep you busy. We know of course why we can’t go out but can’t really explain that to our dogs. The week before we were locked down our  training classes were stopped, and Time who is just 18 months really did not understand, every time I went out he thought he should come as well, but now he is used to just going  for his walk. He seems to think I am at home so I can play ball with him! He has a selection of balls in his toy box, and like a child chooses a different one for me to play with him, although he does have favourite ones. We also do some scent training and some other exercises, so when some time in the future we are able to get back to some sort of normality, he will not have forgotten everything.

Talking of normality I do not think any of us that have attended Crufts or Discover Dogs at the NEC and the Excel, will be able to think of those buildings in the same way in the future, it really is very scary to think how  many sick people these  buildings will be able to accommodate.

Now on to more positive things, there are two virtual Buhund dog shows running, one on Buhund Buddies and the Forum combined and the other ‘Norwegian Buhund c19 virtual breed show and Championship’, run by the Norwegian Buhund Club of Ireland. They both have different classes and will have separate judges for the different classes, and entries from different countries for the one run by the Buhund Club of Ireland.

There are also forums showing how you can start your dog in various activates at home and in the garden, if you are lucky enough to have one. There are also dog trainers who for a fairly small fee with tell you how to teach your dog tricks etc, to keep the dogs happy by showing you how it is done in videos.

The good side of modern technology has certainly come into its own, not just for people working from home but those of us who are now confined to our houses, as it helps us to keep in touch with friends and Buhund  owners all over the world. For those who do not use Face Book there is always the good old-fashioned phone.

Most days I have had phone call and sometimes video calls.

To keep these notes going over the next few weeks/months with no shows to report on. I am hoping owners will tell how they found the breed and, in some cases, chose their affix. Below is how Lisa Strong found the breed and chose her affix:-

Following our house move and wedding 8yrs ago Alex and I decided that we were now able to commit to having a dog, as we now had a large secure garden, and a field to walk in a couple of  minutes walk away and we both worked within a 15minute drive from home, so it meant that one of us  could go home at lunch time to exercise the dog. At first we tried for a dog from a shelter and I am sad to say that we were turned down by 5 rescue charities/shelters purely because we both worked full time, we tried explain that we would take time off work to get the dog adjusted to living with us, and that one of us would always go home at lunchtime to let the dog out for toilet and exercise but to no avail. As a result we decided to look for  a purebred dog, we started doing research into different breeds and going to Discover Dogs, plus  a few other events such as All About  Dogs.(After watching several people being dragged all over the place by Beagles ,who had a got a scent of something we  decided against them!)Alex felt  he was drawn to the Spitz type.( I didn’t really mind what dog we got).We started looking at Shiba Inu,Euasier,Chow  Chow,Samoyed,Finnish Spitz etc as well  as the Norwegian Buhund .We contacted some breeders to get more information and visited a couple. We contacted Sue Sercombe who has the Kennel name Trelowen(she lived in Peterborough at the time),she invited us to visit her  house and meet the breed. On arrival we were greeted warmly by both humans and dogs alike and promptly were investigated by a litter of three and a half weeks old puppies. We spent a couple of hours there chatting to Sue and meeting the dogs, as we left, we were told that some of the puppies were available, if we did decide that the breed would work for us. Over the next couple of days we did some more research and decided we liked the breed, we then looked into the feasibility of time off work if we were to have one the puppies, and also training classes and dog sitters/walkers near us, plus kennels near us that we might use at a future date. We then let Sue know we would like a male puppy if possible and sent her photos so of our house and garden to prove we had a suitable accommodation. When the pups were five and half weeks old we visited again and quickly got down to  2 boys, one puppy decided it for us by climbing onto my lap and falling asleep and after a later play session doing the same to Alex. We collected our Loki when he was just over 8 weeks. Loki is what I call an ‘old soul’ and is very sensitive to people’s emotions but he is playful and cheeky too. He is fabulous with cats and does agility, rally and Obreedience plus helps out on the Norwegian Buhund stand at DD.

When Loki turned 6 in March 2018, we started discussing adding another dog to our household, and upon deciding we wanted another Buhund, we started letting people know our plans as we were aware that there is often an 18month wait for a puppy. Sue Crocker  contacted us to let us know that her  Noor was expecting and would we possible like one of her puppies, after a bit of discussion between ourselves as this was a lot faster than we had anticipated obtaining  a puppy and a bit  of schedule rejigging ,we happily said that we would  be delighted to have one. Sue sent us pictures and videos of the puppies as they were born, and we had regular updates. We saw the litter at 3 weeks and at 6 weeks, we chose Eris out of the 2 black girls in the litter purely due to her smothering my nose with kisses and trying to steal Alex’s glasses. We collected her at just over 8 weeks and within a week Loki and our cat Kaia had accepted her into the family. Ever since we knew we were getting

a girl we had talked about whether to let her have puppies, and we decided that we felt we were in a position in our lives for this to be a possibility. At 6months Eris and I entered the show ring for the first time and when it became clear that we weren’t terrible in the ring, and could do well on occasion Alex and I decided to choose a  kennel name as we wanted Eris linked to it. We had to submit 3 times in order to get a kennel name; in the ended we had the kennel name of Draccus. This comes from a book called ‘The Name of the Wind’ by Patrick Rothfuss. In the book Draccus is a large herbivorous reptilian creature that has the ability to breathe fire. They are generally believed to be the inspiration for most dragon mythology in the Four Corners. We wanted a name  that links the  courageous and at times independent nature of the Buhunds,and at the same time represents something that Alex and I love aka books. We picked this particular dragon like name, as when Eris  was little her temper tantrums reminded us of when the Dracuss goes on a rampage in the book,and how it rolls on the fire to put it  out (Eris loves wriggling on the carpet and pulling herself along it ) Thank you Lisa very interesting. Eris full name is Leggatts Dancing Queen at Draccus, she also had a successful puppy career and won a RCC at Darlington.

Sadly, the beach walk Sue Crocker was going to arrange over Easter will obviously now not take place, perhaps later in the year.

Margaret Deuchar  margaretdeuchar@gmail.com

The views expressed in Margaret’s Breed Notes are hers and hers alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Norwegian Buhund Club of the UK.