The inimitable Semtex ready for the off.
Divil died dead game at the age of 11, he stayed with his last fox until death. With my two German hunt terriers I went to expensive stud dogs in Germany, but Divil mated Tabasco twice, as he always broke loose and got to her when she was in heat, and he and Tabasco got the best descendants, better than the pure bred ones. Here’s to hybrid vigour. All the dogs I have now come from Divil, Tabasco and my other German terrier Dixie, although other dogs and lines were added later. Is it correct you added British working terrier blood into your own lines after becoming unsatisfied with the pedigree and show bred terriers you were keeping? Saskia: The German hunt terrier originally comes from an inbred line of hunting fox terriers, probably more or less of the sort they call Parson Russell today, crossed with black and tan terriers from England. These were the original Welsh terriers and/or working Fell/Lakeland terriers. Since the German terrier has a closed stud book for over 80 years now and is suffering heavily from inbreeding, all I did was to breed some good, proven individuals back to the old British working lines where they come from. In my bloodline are 4
Chili
German hunt terriers, and further, Divil the white Fell terrier, a dog imported to Holland which worked foxes till she dropped, and she came from Wales and looked like a Fell/Bedlington cross. And a black rough coated Fell/working Lakeland dog called Barney from Adrian Simpson, a dog with Patterdale blood and from the lines of Nick Stevens. He was imported to Belgium and ended up with Alain, a man who worked with terriers for many years. I was dissatisfied with the Russells here, because they lacked nose, courage and orientation, and were not steady of character. I was dissatisfied with the pure German terrier because it had a lot of inbreeding and character issues. Both these breeds were usually too big for fox earths. Eventually, I gave up all my papers and official FCI (European Kennel Club) membership, since I couldn’t find the working dogs I needed within their breeds. Did you find that adding this blood improved your stock? Saskia: Yes, it improved my stock, and since I liberated myself from every show circus and official pedigree thing, from now on I can keep my bloodline ‘open’ to any improvement from any good worker, since I don’t have to obey to the rules of breed clubs and closed stud books and the breeding of silly show stuff which can’t work, or is so inbred that they have hereditary problems. Of course, I had to give in the commerce: since my dogs are not pure bred any more, they are not worth any money, they are not ‘a breed’ they don’t belong to any club; it is just for hunting, and for the honour that other hunters want my dogs. And I only breed for myself. Did it come from any particular strain or simply working blood? SO: I just bred to those I could get my hands on, those that were working with other terrier people over here, people who work their dogs seriously and hard like I do. And those that I liked for character and size and coat, and working ability. I never went to England to get me a good working terrier, I have no connections there, although I used to go to Ireland a lot in the past, this was for the music, not yet for the dogs. It would certainly be different now, and I would like to get in contact with serious people breeding and working terriers in England and Ireland. I feel that in Britain, there are a lot of show terriers, and even ‘working’ show terriers, but a hard core of real terrier men still keep the good sort, because Britain and Ireland are the traditional terrier stronghold and will hopefully remain the genetic source. On the continent, working terriers are more and more in use now in hunting circles, especially to wild pigs, where they stand out in performance above all other dog breeds. Countrysports and Country Life Summer 2013
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