Home   Shetla's Boisterous Breeze shows off her stunning profile
 
NEWS
THE SHETLA GIRLS
   BREEZY
   CHAYA
   ETZI
   RINA
   SMARTY
 RETIRED:
   RONJA
   REA
 DECEASED:
   TOSCA
   TILDA
   LUNA
ABOUT SHETLA
ARTICLES
DANSK/DANISH
Webmaster@shetla
Member of the Danish Shetland Sheepdog Club
Member of the Danish Kennel Club
FCI
 

About Shetla

We have been sheltie owners since 1980. The prefix or kennel name was added in 1995 when we bred our first litter.
I am a member of the Danish Kennel Club, the Danish Shetland Sheepdog Club and the English Shetland Sheepdog Club.

From left: Tilda, Ronja, Breezy and Rea. In front: Luna

The Shetla Girls in the dunes at Tannishus (Northern Jutland) 2002.
Back row from the left: Tilda (9 yo), Ronja (9 yo), Breezy (3½ yo) and Rea (7 yo). In front: Luna (2 yo).

More about us currently



How the first shelties came to be
The photo below shows me with our first two shelties, Trixie og Tanya. The photo was taken on a visit to Robin Hood's hide-out in Sherwood Forest. The dogs were obviously at the leggy stage!

Nanna with Trixie (front) and Tanya Trixie & Tanya

The two first family shelties were acquired when I was 9 years old. We were living in England at the time because my dad's work had sent him there. My mum had always favoured larger dogs, and we had a Newfoundland earlier. But the thing was that we were living in a rented house - with no dogs allowed! The owners were somewhere in the East - Bangkok, Singapore... My mum finally persuaded their agent to forward a plea. She must have been convincing. I think a warped dogless childhood was mentioned. We were graciously granted permission to keep one small dog.

My mum is not a bibliophile for nothing. She immediately started studying dog literature to find the right breed. She decided on the Shetland Sheepdog because it sounded like a large dog in a small package. Off we went to a large sales kennel. To my knowledge nothing like this exists in Denmark (thankfully). Puppies of many different breeds were collected from hobby breeeders. It was not actually a dog factory, but still definitely not the best place to buy a dog. Being removed from adult dogs at such an early age deprives the puppies of learning valuable social skills. We were fairly lucky with the dogs we purchased though, considering.

We brought home a small sable sheltie puppy that we called Trixie. Two weeks later when we ran out of dog food, my dad declared that since we were going up there anyway to buy more food, we might as well buy another puppy so Trixie would have something else to bite than his ankles. And if anyone complained, we would just say they were seeing double.

From a new large litter I picked Tanya. An adorable little sable with a big white collar. Every time she saw me at the door to their pen, she would sit and bark with delight: "Look at me!" I am tempted to say that in fact she picked me.

So Trixie became my mum's dog and Tanya became mine. Even though neither was from a well-known breeder, they had the famous sire Jefsfire Freelancer in their pedigrees. They followed us on our many outings in England and when we moved back to Denmark. They lived till they were 12½. Both are now buried in my parents' garden in Virum.

More to come...