How it all started…
At the 20th anniversary of our story with Basset Hounds, we decided to write a bit about where we’ve come from! An exhaustive record of every single dog in the history of our kennel would become very long winded, so this is a history summarizing some of the most important dogs that shaped our kennel into what it has become today.
As an animal-loving teenager, I was lucky to be raised on a farm, where there was always an abundance of critters, and always a family dog or two. However, at a certain point I wanted a dog of my very own. While I didn’t know a whole lot about purebred dogs, how to find a breeder, etc, luck would have it that Howlnsuccess Darling Daph came to live with us! “Daphne” was the ultimate companion, although we lost her much to early due to complications with a C-section.
As I was left with a litter of 4 orphan puppies, I quickly learned that breeding dogs is not all sunshine and roses! Fortunately this litter thrived, and out of it we kept Shecara’s Short Stuff, C.D. “Casper” came along with me to college, and he is our connection to the past – his progeny are still with us many generation later. Casper was my training wheels in the dog show world. While he was never shown in conformation – he was my first titled Basset. In just the minimum 3 trials, he earned his C.D. title much to the awe of many owners of the ‘smarter breeds’ in the trials! Two out of the three times he came home with the big, blue, “High in Class” ribbon!
After marrying a fellow dog-lover and settling down into our own place, two new girls joined our home, Mtns Country Isabella, whom we called “Isabelle”, and Mtnscountry Sweet Charming, who was called “Felicity”, the latter of which became one of the pillars of our kennel.
Enter Sailor...
While many kennels have a female that becomes the foundation of their kennel, in our case that claim to fame belongs to a stunning Basset Hound boy, known to the world as “Sailor”. Amsterdam Youth Winner ’03 Ch. Black Nose Sailor Maintain, CGN joined our home all the way from the Netherlands and we are still indebted to Greetje for trusting us with her special boy.
Sailor made life-long impressions on everyone who had the priviledge of meeting him! He was a one-of-a-kind stunning boy with not only a great temperament and structure who lived a long life, he also was an amazing producer.
Sailor, Felicity and Isabella were our first show dogs, and first champions, all finishing easily and got us hooked on the show world!
Our first import girl also came from the Netherlands, “The Third Kind Vinny”, whom we called “Venus”.
The next generation...
Sailor mated to various girls gave us our next generation of brood girls (and one boy!)
The quest for new blood began once again, and resulted in Edgar van Hollandheim joining us!
Edgar was not with us for long, but left us two daughters to carry on his legacy.
The next noteworthy import came from the south this time, from Lake Park Kennels in Brazil. Lake Park Nemo became one of the top producers in our kennel.
Some of his offspring include:
As we draw nearer to today, we note that not all of our Basset Hounds were produced by import studs. Here are a few of our true Shecara Bassets, out of our own blooming bloodline.
And that is a brief summary of the first 20 years of our kennel! You can find more information about our current dogs on the Our Bassets page, visit our list of Champions, and of course check in on what’s happening in the Whelping box! We thank you for all of the support over the past two decades!