The quest to find Lhasa two!

Shortly after getting my lovely Chess, I joined a forum for Lhasa owners and through other members, I saw my first black Lhasa. I fell in love (again!) and just had to have one, and the search was on again. Not that it was any hardship as I could spent 24/7 just browsing the different kennels and seeing their dogs.

I found a breeder who might get a couple of blacks from a litter they were expecting as the mother was black, so I 'put my name forward' for one if indeed there was a black one. As luck would have it, there were two and I went to choose one when the litter had safely reached 4 weeks. Mr. Darcy, as we had decided to name him, was beautiful (aren't they all) with a mainly black body but with four tiny white paws and a white chest....and if you looked carefully, you may have noticed the tiniest white tip on the end of his tail :). He is from the Belazieth kennel.

Around the same time, the Kutani breeder contacted me to let me know that her bitch had delivered a litter just one week earlier than the Belazieth so that made me a mummy in waiting to not one but TWO Lhasa babies! I was so excited!! I swear that was the longest 4 weeks of my life waiting for these little ones but of course, the time arrived. Firstly Thomas, which is the name we gave to the Kutani baby, then Mr Darcy the following week.

The top pic is Thomas aged about 5 weeks and this little one above is Mr Darcy aged four weeks.

The begining

Hello, I am Suzanne Porter and I am new to the Lhasa Apso breed. I had wanted either a Lhasa or a Shi Tzu for many years but as I had a young family and worked full time, I didn't have the time to commit to looking after a pet, especially one with such grooming needs!

A change in domestic circumstances meant that I was now free start searching for my first puppy and as it turned out, I saw the Lhasa first and I was smitten. The search was on to find my very first Lhasa. The plan was for one, then I thought that it would be nice to have two for reasons of company, so began my search for good and responsible breeders. My initial search found a local - ish breeder in the Vaderlands kennel whom I contacted with an enquiry as to whether they had or were planning a litter in the near future. As luck would have it, plans were in place to breed a litter and I asked if I could go along and see their dogs, as per all the recommendations I had read about choosing a puppy.

My initial plan was to have a light coloured, preferably white or cream coloured Lhasa but I didn't really give a thought to that when approaching the first breeder and when I saw their dogs, I was in love! Gorgeous light gold colours and such lovely temperaments and expressions.

I was duly questioned to make sure I was a suitable guardian for one of these lovely babies and once the breeders were happy that I would provide a loving home for their precious pup, plans were put in place for them to contact me when their bitch was confirmed as being pregnant.

In the meantime, I had been looking round for a second Lhasa pup to keep company with my first one, this time focussing on white or very light coloured coated dogs. This brought me to Kutani and again, I was smitten. My interest in the breed as a whole, rather than just for my own planned puppies, was whetted when I read some of the histories of these beautiful dogs and I 'googled' many breeders in my quest for quality dogs with responsible breeders.

Not very long after I had approached my Vaderlands breeders, I was contacted to see if I was interested in an older bitch which they had kept from a previous litter as a future show prospect but, perfect in every other way, she had grown too big for the breed standard. At first I said no as I really wanted a baby to rear from the start, but I had seen this puppy and couldn't stop thinking about the offer, so I called them back and said that if they still had her when the new puppies were born, I would like to take her as well as the puppy, which would make my planned two.

To cut a long story short, I took the older bitch, who was 6 months old and so began my life as a Lhasa owner! The pup had been called Frankie by the breeder but I decided to feminise that a bit and called her Francesca, shortened to Chess.

I collected her on 21st August 2010 and this was my lovely Chess on that day.