2010 FEATURED AKITA BREEDER

My Akita Breeding Program

by Cindy Smith / Akitas CAS

Like so many show people, I started with a pet quality Akita (in 1976) whose personality traits cemented my love for the breed that I thought was so beautiful. My breeding program started many years later when my pets passed away and I decided to get into showing.

I was lucky to have Bob Campbell (Okii Yubi Akitas) living close in north Atlanta and I visited him to look at a litter he had produced. Bob is the breeder Sachmo, the legendary Akita owned by BJ Andrews, for whom he became the top winning Akita and the top Working Dog producer - the sire of 101 champions. 

 Bob said something to me that has stuck with me all these years. I wanted Bob’s pick puppy and he laughed when I told him I wanted to buy it. I asked him what I could do to get a puppy like that. He said “You breed it yourself”. What words of wisdom! 

My first attempt at buying show dogs was a disaster - going with a breeder whose dogs were pretty, but lawsuits waiting to happen - a huge lesson on the importance of temperament first. By the end of those first few WASTED years I had done my homework and had a better idea of where to go to get my bitch that would produce a puppy for me as nice as Bob’s pick.

Looking at all the Akita puppy ads, the idea hit me that :

• Sachmo babies were the most CONSISTENTLY (a VERY important word) typey, and
• There were a lot of ugly Akitas out there but two girls were CONSISTENTLY producing the nicest Akitas -  they were littermates, and they were double Sachmo grand daughters.

Yes, gasp: LINEBRED.

So I now knew what I wanted but getting it also involved the intangible luck factor which I call blessings. I finally found the girl that started my kennel, my foundation bitch from those lines, bred by a breeder in Canada named Shirley Burley. Her dam (the dams have always been my biggest consideration) was a group placing girl out of one of the double Sachmo grand daughters. I bought a puppy bitch from her only litter based on the pedigree alone. When I pulled her out of the crate, I saw that I had been blessed with a girl that was also SO NICE physically that she herself later won Breed at an Akita regional specialty! She was my foundation: BISS CH. Shibusa Canadian Maid ROM “Cori”.

CAS Akitas Breeding Foundation:

CH. CAS Mama CAS ROM “Cassie” was another foundation girl for Akitas CAS and Dozak Akitas from that breeding. Cassie is a multiple Breed winning bitch and an ROM producer herself. 

Cassie produced CH. Dozak-CAS Dream A Little Dream “Chelsea” when she was bred to BIS/BISS CH. Kamikazi’s Remington, #1 Akita several years running. Remington's dam was out of one of the double Sachmo grand daughters, so Chelsea was even further linebred on that gene pool. Chelsea finished her championship with majors won at TWO Akita regional specialties, including a five point major in Tampa during the tough Florida circuit. Chelsea’s first litter was a linebreeding back to Credo (seen below).

I am so excited about this litter that I have kept THREE pups from it, one of which is CAS American Classic - Akitas CAS future foundation bitch.

Shown two weekends to date, Classic already has 8 points, both majors, Breed over specials AND an AOM title - from the 6 month puppy class! There is a very real possibility that Chelsea will have five pups finished from this one breeding alone. Can’t convince me of the sins of LINEBREEDING at this rate.... That is four generations of top winning bitches based on the strong gene pool of bitches from double Sachmo grand daughters.  After doing the Cori breeding that produced Cassie, etc - I went a long time without finding a male to breed her to that I was excited about.

I finally found “Zanadou” Am/Can CH. Serdess Zanadou de LauClair, a male that I was so excited about that I BOUGHT him. (See my breeding rule #1 below.)

I was judging working dogs at a local match and in walked an Akita puppy that took my breath away. This dog had some faults, but he had a PISTON like rear and PERFECT shoulders - the boy could move! He was just a baby, but I had been to two Nationals and not seen a dog that excited me as much as he did. (The girl that owned him was a novice who later went on to put an owner handled Group One on the dog.) The breeder of the pup was a man I knew of in Canada, and my first call when I got home was to him to see find out about that breeding. To make a long story a little shorter, I ended up paying the big bucks to buy his pick male - the one he had kept for himself. I was lucky/blessed to have done so, as that litter is the

 All Time Top Winning Akita Litter

With four brothers (Zanadou included) having won a Group ONE placement. Consistent, consistent, consistent on the male genes, and I knew I had found Cori’s next breeding.

The Cori/Zanadou cross produced 3 champions (out of 4 babies). The only bitch in the litter is another foundation bitch, CH. CAS Gotta Love Me ROM “Charizma”

After waiting four years to find the right male to breed Charizma to - when I finally found him I also decided that I liked him enough to want him, paying more money than I will ever admit. 

That male was “Putzi”, BIS/BISS CH. Regalia’s Sposalizio of Serdess AOM.  I bought him on a co-ownership with Richard Short when he was a puppy, and he then went on to win an all breed Best In Show and the distinction of being the youngest Akita to have won that title AND he was owner-handled by Richard! He is now owned by Richard in full.

Charizma’s first and second breedings to Putzi have produced five champions to date with another very close to finishing.

Another male from that cross “Credo” CH. CAS Work What Is Good finished in 11 shows with four majors, and is the sire of Classic, my Chelsea daughter shown above, as well as her other 4 littermates that we are looking forward to being old enough to show.

Credo’s younger brother “Country” CH. CAS Proud To Be An American finished his championship in only nine shows. That is something to be proud of in today's Akita  competition.

Also pictured (to the left) is their beautiful white sister “Caiya” CH. CAS Taboo Kitia Ten Karat.

 Credo has excelled as a stud. He's been bred twice to date, the first time to Cassie for her last breeding. 

The second time he was bred to Chelsea so in fact, both breedings were line-breedings on Cori.  This tells us what we have in her, and in Credo. 

CH. CAS Dozak I Got It “Catcher”and “Faith” are 2 of the 4 pups produced by Credo and Cassie.

Catcher finished his championship in 8 shows - beating any record of mine so far - and is now the sire of his first litter.

Pictured is what we are sure will be our next Akita CAS champion “Cobo.”

Cobo is another example of why I linebreed.  He represents a fifth generation male from a consistently strong male gene pool at Akitas CAS.

Charizma’s third breeding was to Putzi’s sire: BIS/BISS CH. T’Stone’s Raja Regalia on Buckridge ROMPX. While her breeding to Putzi was a  linebreeding, as Putzi’s dam was Zanadou’s sister from the top winning Akita litter, her breeding to Raja was an outcross. That breeding produced nice, although not as consistently nice - with one of the babies being a puppy champion (Charizma’s sixth champion to date) and the dam of Cobo above, and another who we believe will be the first brindle male to attain an English championship. At less than one year of age he already has one CC and four reserve CC s towards that title!

Two rules I follow when choosing Akitas for my breeding program:

#1 - If you see something out there that you like better then your own dogs - BUY it or breed to it. Don’t waste time gossiping about it or tearing it down like so many unsuccessful breeders!

Acknowledge the fact that the dog is better then yours, and if you can successfully incorporate him/her into your breeding program then DO SO - even if it means making the hard decision to pet out something you thought was the cat’s pajamas until you saw THIS dog. And don’t be skimpy - saving money on a lesser dog is going to cost you in the long run. If you see what you want and you don’t have it - get it.

#2 - If you are going to linebreed, make sure that you have done your homework. Linebreeding is only going to work if you are breeding on CONSISTENTLY sound and healthy dogs. Consistency is the KEY word! This is the worst time to wear blinders, or to excuse the pet pup from the litter with a serious fault. You WILL produce it in the future, so only do the breeding if the worst is something you would want to keep yourself.

Go to Akitas CAS to see new Akita puppies or upcoming litters

Craige and Cindy Smith reside in Georgia and can be reached at 770-251-7127
or akitascas@mindspring.com

http://www.thedogplace.org/Gallery/Akita/Refl/MyBreeding-Smith-064.asp  #064125

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