About us
We're a small kennel (home, really) in Southern California, out in rural San Diego County. 'We' is made of myself, a work-from-home mom who has been through various life phases including homeschooling the boys, being a soccer mom, supporting and motorcycling with my husband of many decades and of course the livestock and poultry on our tiny ranch, and my husband, a telephone company linesman working his way towards retirement in the next few years, when we can then spend a lot more time with our five sons, their spouses and significant others, and of course the grandkids.
​
As our boys have grown we've had and bred horses, heritage dairy goats, heritage turkeys and chickens, a few odd lambs and a cow or two and now that the youngest is 18 and poised to fly the nest (once college is through, or nearly so) we are down to just the poultry, a few lambs once in a while, a pair of house-and-barn cats, and of course our beloved Canaan Dogs.
​
Our Mission as breeders is to preserve this landrace breed, focusing on the standard and also the functionality of the breed as nature designed it. Please read more about the history of the Canaan Dog Breed and learn a bit about what we strive to retain and preserve as we choose our breeding stock; it's never just about the show ring with us, it's about producing dogs that are as like their ancestors in the wild as is possible while still being able to live happily with humans in today's lifestyles, with or without their original jobs of herding, guarding, and companioning the nomadic Bedouin tribes of Israel. Our primary goal is to retain all the functionality built in by natural development while furthering the breed's population in a responsible way.
​
Our story with Canaan Dogs started when I was very VERY pregnant with our youngest (now 18.5 years old) child and looking for a place to sit while husband and the kids ran around the pet store getting what we needed for our various animals at home. There was an ongoing adoption event and a woman kindly offered me her seat next to the pen of four puppies she was trying to find homes for. Adorable, these pups ranged from reserved to friendly and I was listening to her educate me on what a Canaan Dog was and how she came to have this litter, from an elderly couple who were no longer able to care for their dogs and the also-senior children didn't wish to. As husband returned to my side, one of the female pups leapt into his arms and suddenly we were bringing home a fifteen-week-old puppy.
​
The next morning the woman called to check on our girl and when I asked her about the others, she said two more had been adopted and the little reserved male was left, an only puppy in her household of senior dogs. I offered to have him stay with his sister at our house until her next adoption event and before noon he was here as well. Within a day, I'd gone into labor and by the end of the week we had another son (our fifth) and of course TWO puppies. A foster fail but certainly a good one for us.
​
As these two dogs grew our older dogs passed and we started to think about another, eventually acquiring a CDRN rescue five-year-old, spayed girl, then a young purebred stud puppy from CT (our first experience flying a puppy to us) and eventually a beautiful young girl from NC (via Minneapolis - thanks, Keith!) and a gorgeous little bundle from Alaska. All in all, we're pretty happy with every Canaan Dog we've had thus far, learning about both patience and partnership. Our goal is to continue our relationship with the breed and to continue producing puppies that fit into today's homes with confidence and character true to breed type.
