History of the kennel/bloodline

Initial 5 years: My concept of an ideal Airedale formed while attending national specialties, collecting and reading an extensive library on Airedale history and during competition in obedience and conformation. I found competition to be expensive and very intensive in my time and energy. I began to interpret, appreciate, and understand the breed standard. I owe a debt of gratitude to the 1976 edition of the The New Complete Airedale Terrier, by Gladys Brown Edwards (Howell Publishing) for the material presented on the breed's standard.

My interpretation of the Airedale standard follows: The structure of the dog is expressed in movement. Correct movement is smoothly effortless and flowing, with no high stepping, or side motion of the paws or legs, and with a level, strong topline. This is associated with correct and balanced angulation in both front and rear assemblies, coupled by a moderately short back. The sound skeletal structure is necessary to which the moderate tapering neck, distinctive head, and hard, rich colored coat round out the attractive total image. While this sounds rather technical, I found good reason for each point above while competing in obedience, jumping, showing, and actively working with Airedales.

Pedigree #1 (Casey) shows my start. From 1979 to 1982, I was wandering. I tried several breedings, some quite unsuccessful for what I wanted. I studied Jacki's pedigree trying to figure out where to go from there. Unfortunately, she wasn't really bred with any strong direction for me to follow. I tried breeding to CH Barbate Henchman when he was 9 or 10 years old-no puppies resulted. Jacki was very feminine, but had a long back, slightly low tailset, and a close rear. I was tremendously impressed by the True Grit/Star Buck brothers. Breeding to True Grit corrected all three problems in the daughter, Chance.

At this point, I reasoned that the West Coast bottom portion of the two brothers' pedigree was widely available to others and had been around for some time, yet had not produced anything like the brothers. They were "hybred" or outcrosses. So I decided to let others with good West Coast lines work with that and I decided to concentrate my efforts on Bengal Tarquin. I felt that he was the different part of the pedigree. No one else took that angle--separating from the West Coast lines, and de-emphasizing the bottom of the pedigree. I saved a dog and two bitches from this litter. I liked the puppies produced in the first generation.

The Next 10 Years: Seek and Ye Shall Find….Eventually. The search for a family of Airedales that possessed clean breed type with substance, and the intelligence and desire to work with people took time, effort, and a lot of persistence. The lowest possible incidence of Canine Hip Dyplasia, eye defects, or any other genetic problem was and continues to be a high priority. After five years of working with several backgrounds, I found what I was looking for in the older English lines from before 1970, specifically the Bengal lines, descending through Eng CH Bengal Flamboyant and Eng & International CH Bengal Tarquin. Flamboyant, an influential sire in England, died in the mid-seventies, at over 12 years of age. Eng & Int CH Bengal Tarquin had been offered for sale in 1979 and sold to South America. Sadly, Molly Harmsworth, who founded and was the guiding force of the Bengal line for over 60 years, died in July, 1981. By fall, 1982, the news had arrived from Argentina that Tarquin had died at age 8. After a year of correspondence to his owner, Grand and Argentine CH Fairyland For Ever Good Florence arrived in the U.S. in November, 1983. "Goody" is the only daughter of Tarquin ever imported to the U.S., one of the last granddaughters of Flamboyant. She had been bred to a British import, Int. CH Perrancourt Piquet. Then she produced a litter by CH White Rose Rocka My Soul, a son of CH Turith Country Cousin. This winning combination produced puppies who later earned Specialty, Group, and High In Trial honors, including VDH & Am CH Seneca Stony Stone Brandit UD.

Pedigree #2 (Bo) shows my search to find offspring of Bengal Tarquin so that there would be something on which to linebreed. This shows the import of the only daughter of Tarquin to come to the US. I attempted to breed her to True Grit-no puppies resulted. I sent her to Bobbi Brennan (White Rose) and asked her if she would pick between Rocky and Ernie. I favored Rocky and Bobbie did too. I kept and finished a dog (Stony) and a bitch (Steppe) from this litter, but the bitch died right after her championship due to an accident and was never bred. Stony is the sire of 20+ CH, mostly as the product of my own breedings to him. Two daughters were BOS at National Specialties, won Groups, and were ranked #1 ADT bitch in the country (one in Terrier Type system, one in Canine Chronicle system) all in the same year. At the same time, I had tracked a son of Tarquin to Germany. He was not for sale, so I then sent a bitch there, with a daughter returning to the states two years later. When these two lines united to produce an incredible litter, including "Bo", I knew was on to something.

In the puppy aptitudes tests, more puppies were retrieving, following, and showing the drives and potential for easy training. This helped Seneca Airedales to attract more owners interested in training, leading to more titles earned, which also attracts more trainers-once again showing that nothing succeeds like success. In health matters, the dogs were beginning to have a very high occurrence of OFA Excellent hip certifications compared to the breed population.

Then 5 More Years : Three slightly different lines were co-existing in the Seneca Airedales through the 1980's, but over a period of years, the family carrying "Chance" in the maternal line names has become the most successful line. In the 1990's during the fourth and fifth generations, I found that I needed outcrosses and tried several different lines in the U.S. Each time, there were persistent traits from the outcrosses that didn't meet my interpretation of the standard, or introduced health problems. Few of the outcrosses remained in our kennel because of this.

Pedigree #3 (Ajax) brings together #1 & #2, and is an example of a pedigree that has produced an explosion of titled offspring. We were getting fabulous bitches, but no good stud dogs and I lost "Stony" in 1995 when he was almost 11 years old. Linda Coates had bred to Stony and finished a Championship on "Butler" from that litter. The full brother "Charley" was #1 obedience dog for 3 straight years and died at the peak of his career at age 7 from a tumor-greatly upsetting his owner. There have been 3 UDX dogs in the history of the breed and two of them are the brothers, Butler and Charley. I raised up a succession of young males, placing all of them for one reason or another, waiting for a "really good" if not "great" one. I searched for dogs from other lines to breed to that would keep my goals and priorities in place and couldn't find anything that I really liked. Puppies from several outcrosses were placed. Oddly, Butler--not a great conformation champion--showed an ability to produce better males than he is--no disrespect intended. In 1997, bred to Foxy, he had a very good litter with many males titling in obedience homes. Linda Coates and I encourage the owners to show in conformation because they are nice! Their high level of quality can't be proved if they are not shown but the owners' primary interest is in obedience--one became the youngest TD in the breed at 6 months, 3 days old. Perhaps one or two will make it into the conformation rings.

So when the litter was repeated in 1999, I got a dog and a bitch from the litter. Ajax winning the major at 11 months at the Ohio Specialty with my own handling from Bred-by was a wonderful thrill! Note the "braiding" of the bloodlines carrying Tarquin. The first litters sired by Ajax will help me evaluate how best to benefit from his use.

Pedigree #4 (Bisquit) shows the sister of Ajax, Jigs, who finished her AKC Championship before the age of 2 and received an OFA certification of Excellent as did her brother Ajax. She has been backcrossed to CH Turith Country Cousin, 14 years after his death at age 13, using frozen semen. From that litter of 10 born June 1, 2002, I kept a female (Bisquit) and so did Linda Coates (Caper), and a few other trainers have some of the brothers.

Pedigree # 5 (Pete) shows a possible answer to the persistent outcrossing problem. While traveling in Germany in the late 1990's, I found some very interesting dogs that provide an outcross to the Seneca Airedales, which has shown very promising results in this new decade. This has prompted me to try outcrosses with "Luckiboy" and "Jenna". CH Seneca Ochocho Pete UD (has legs on UDX) or "Pete", is 50% German and 50% Seneca lines. The imports I am working with from Germany are producing healthy, attractive dogs that like to work. They combine well with our dogs and maintain our health and conformation standards. The Seneca Airedales are now into the eighth generation during a period of more than 20 years.

Well, that concludes my summary. Actually, it serves to evaluate progress and strategies to date and is an aid in planning where I will go from here...