My first appenzeller Zita (Eijatuun Zita) moved in our house in 1994, I was a 6-year-old at the time. I went with my mom to see Fenrisin Cina who gave birth to 5 puppies in January. One of the puppies had an error in the coloring of her muzzle – it was our own little spot! I learned a lot from Zita – she didn’t learn quite as much from me since mom was the one to train her because of my young age – and he was my loyal friend always waiting for me to get home from school and come play with her.

As a teenager I was of course interested in a lot of things not always related to appenzellers but when it came the time for Zita to leave us it made me realise how much I had indeed loved her.

Our house was so empty and there was such a deep appenzeller’s pawprint in my heart that it immediately became clear that there would be an appenzeller in this house again!

About six months went by before puppies were born to kennel Eijatuun in Pirkkala. I had seen the puppies’ mother with her previous litter and I was very fond of her loving nature. So, it was quite obvious that our new family member would be one the five pups. Before that I got the opportunity to get to know the puppies’ father’s side of the family as their Eija’s own dog Thelma (Eijatuun Opera Bruno) came to live with us for a month. This was a great learning experience since I already knew the mother’s side since that was the same line from which Zita had been. I got to know both lines which are quite different.

Romi (Eijatuun Riimi) moved home spring 2007! She turned out to be everything – and even more – than we had expected and immediately stole a place in my heart.

Romi was officially Eija’s dog - since she was going to be used for breeding by her and possibly also by me in the future - but she lived in my care. Unfortunately Romi’s knees weren’t healthy. Her left knee’s patella luxation was surgically fixed in April 2008 and to avoid the unwanted hormonally triggered looseness in her joints she was sterilised in September 2008.

 

As you can see in the results page I’ve went to dog shows with all my dogs and probably will continue doing so in the future. With Romi we’ve also tried obedience and tracking.

 

To get my breeding started we are expecting a new family member in the near future. Time will tell if the “little sister” will become the broodbitch of kennel Zirotami.